The Fall of Troy Sung

59He spoke; the poet felt the inspiring god,
And sang, beginning where the Argives hurled
Firebrands among their tents, and sailed away
In their good galleys, save the band that sat
Beside renowned Odysseus in the horse,
Concealed from sight, amid the Trojan crowd,
Who now had drawn it to the citadel.
So there it stood, while, sitting round it, talked
The men of Troy, and wist not what to do.
By turns three counsels pleased them —to hew down
The hollow trunk with the remorseless steel;
Or drag it to a height, and cast it thence
Headlong among the rocks; or, lastly, leave
The enormous image standing and unharmed,
An offering to appease the gods. And this
At last was done; for so had fate decreed
That they should be destroyed whenever their town
Should hold within its walls the horse of wood,
In which the mightiest of the Argives came
Among the sons of Troy to smite and slay.
Then sang the bard how, issuing from the womb
Of that deceitful horse, the sons of Greece
Laid Ilium waste; how each in different ways
Ravaged the town, while, terrible as Ares,
Odysseus, joined with Menelaus, sought
The palace of Deiphobus, and there
Maintained a desperate battle, till the aid
Of mighty Athena made the victory his.

60So sang renowned Demodocus; the strain
Melted to tears Odysseus, from whose lids
They dropped and wet his cheeks. As when a wife
Weeps her beloved husband, slain before
His town and people, fighting to defend
Them and his own dear babes from deadly harm,
She sees him gasp and die, and at the sight
She falls with piercing cries upon his corpse,
Meantime the victors beat her on the back
And shoulders with their spears, and bear her off
To toil and grieve in slavery, where her cheeks
In that long bitter sorrow lose their bloom;
So from the eyelids of Odysseus fell
The tears, yet fell unnoticed by them all
Save that Alcinous, sitting at his side,
Saw them, and heard his heavy sighs, and thus
Bespoke his people, masters of the oar: —