Book XX · Ῥαψωδία υ

Meanwhile that goat Odysseus was crashing out in the front porch,

he flattened a raw oxhide on the floor, then piled up on top of it

a fat heap of fleeces off the sheep the Achaeans kept slaughtering, no chill,

and Eurynome chucked a cloak over him the second he settled in to sleep.

And there Odysseus lay, lowkey cooking up doom for the suitors deep in his chest,

the ones who'd been sneaking off to link with the suitors this whole arc,

came filing past, cackling among themselves, living their absolute best lives.

And the man's spirit got stirred straight up inside his ribs,

he was turning it over and over, brain working overtime, gut churning too,

or let them link with the suitors, those entitled clowns, one more time,

the final go, the closing round: and his heart was straight up barking inside him.

Like a mum dog posted up over her tiny defenceless pups,

barking at some rando she can't clock, fully itching to throw hands,

So he smacked his chest and dragged his own heart with this line:

"Hold the line, heart: you've stomached worse than this, no cap,

that day the Cyclops, an absolute unstoppable menace, was eating up

my strongest boys: and you held it down, until that big-brain energy

That's what he said, getting a grip on the soul inside his chest,

and his heart fell in line, locked into obedience, holding rock steady

without one single crack: but the man himself kept rolling side to side.

Like when somebody's got a stomach packed with fat and blood,

this way and that, dying for it to be done already and off the heat,

that's how he kept tossing back and forth, brain running a mile a minute

over how he'd lay hands on those shameless suitors,

one man against a whole mob. And then Athena pulled up close,

she posted up right over his head and dropped these words on him:

"Why are you up again, the most cursed of every living soul?

This is your house right here, no cap, and your wife's right inside it,

and your kid too, the kind of son anybody would pray to land."

"Yeah, goddess, no lie, every word of that lands exactly right,

but here's the thing my spirit keeps spinning round in my head,

how I'm even meant to lay hands on those shameless suitors,

just me, solo: and they're always packed inside, full crowd.

say I did body them, with your backing and Zeus's too,

where do I even bolt to after? I'm begging you, think on that."

Then Athena, grey-eyed and fully dialled in, came back at him:

"You poor stubborn thing, plenty of people lean on a weaker mate,

but me? I'm a god, the one who's got your back without fail

through every grind. And I'll spell it out for you, zero riddles:

even if fifty whole companies of mortal men

pulled up and ringed the two of us, blood-hungry to kill,

But come on, let sleep grab you too: it's pure misery, this keeping watch

awake all night, and you're about to slip out clean from under your troubles."

That's what she said, and she poured sleep over his eyelids,

then she, that goat of a goddess, dipped right back up to Olympus.

the limb-melting kind, his wife jolted awake, the loyal big-brain one,

and she sat up sobbing on her soft bed, fully in her feels.

But once she'd cried until her spirit had drunk its fill of it,

that goddess among women shot her first prayer straight to Artemis:

put an arrow through my chest and rip the life clean out of me,

this very second, or let some storm-blast come snatch me up

and carry me off down the misty roads, ghosting the lot of it,

and fling me into the mouth of backward-flowing Ocean.

the gods had wiped out their parents, and the girls were left

orphaned in the halls, and divine Aphrodite kept them fed

on cheese and sweet honey and lovely wine, the full spread,

and Hera handed them, above all other women out there,

and Athena schooled them in the famous handicrafts, locked in.

But while divine Aphrodite was climbing up tall Olympus

to ask Zeus to seal the girls a thriving glow-up of a marriage,

Zeus, who's all about the thunder, the one who knows everything cold,

that whole time the Harpies snatched those girls clean away

and handed them off as slaves to the hated Furies, no rescue coming:

that's exactly how I wish the gods who hold Olympus would erase me,

or lovely-braided Artemis would shoot me down, so I could go

and never gladden the heart of some lesser, mid man.

But honestly that misery's bearable, the kind where somebody

cries through the days, properly gutted right to the core,

but at night sleep takes them, the sleep that wipes everything,

But me? Even my dreams, some spirit keeps slamming bad ones at me.

Tonight again there was someone lying beside me, the spit of him,

looking dead-on like he did marching off with the army, and my heart

was buzzing, because I didn't clock it as a dream, but real, finally."

And Odysseus, that goat, caught the sound of her crying drifting over,

and then his brain started racing, and in his spirit it hit

like she already clocked him and was standing right over his head.

So he scooped up the cloak and the fleeces he'd slept on

out the door, and lifting his hands up to Zeus he prayed:

"Father Zeus, if you gods willingly carried me back over land and sea

to my own country after you put me through it so brutally,

let somebody waking up inside this house drop me a sign with their words,

That's what he prayed, and Zeus the schemer caught every single word,

and right away he cracked a thunderclap off shining Olympus,

high up out of the clouds: and Odysseus, that goat, was buzzing big-time.

And a sign came from inside the house, off a woman at the mill

Twelve women all up were grinding away at those stones, no breaks,

turning out barley meal and flour, the marrow of men, the daily fuel:

the rest had already crashed out, done grinding their wheat,

but this one alone hadn't quit, the frailest of the whole crew:

"Father Zeus, you who run the whole show for gods and people both,

you sure cracked off a loud one out of the starry sky just now,

not a cloud anywhere in sight: you're dropping this as a sign for someone.

So make it land for poor little me too, this thing I'm about to say:

lovely feast in the halls of Odysseus, please, on god,

the ones who drained the strength clean out of my knees with heart-aching toil,

me grinding out their meal: let this be the last dinner they ever score."

That's what she said, and Odysseus, that goat, was buzzing at the omen

And the other servant women through the gorgeous halls of Odysseus

got up and got the never-dying fire blazing back in the hearth.

And Telemachus rose up from his bed, a man built like a god,

threw his clothes on, slung the sharp sword across his shoulder,

and grabbed his sturdy spear, tipped with sharp bronze, locked and loaded.

He paused on his way out at the threshold and hit Eurycleia with this:

"Auntie, did you lot treat the guest right in the house,

sorting him a bed and a meal, or is he just left lying there, neglected?

on a whim she'll go and honour the worse one of two men

and send the better one packing, zero respect dished out at all."

And then loyal-and-clever Eurycleia came right back at him:

"Nah, you can't go blaming her this time, kid, she's blameless on this.

and said he wasn't hungry anymore: because yeah, she did ask him.

But when it came time to start thinking about bed and sleep,

she told the servant girls to make him up a proper bed,

but he, like some man who's totally wretched and luck-cursed,

nah, he crashed on a raw oxhide and some sheep fleeces

out in the front porch: and we chucked a cloak over him."

That's what she said, and Telemachus strode out through the hall

gripping his spear: two fast-footed dogs trailing right at his heels.

Then she, that goddess among women, called out to the servant girls,

Eurycleia, daughter of Ops, son of Peisenor, taking charge:

"Right, you lot, hustle and get this whole house swept down,

sprinkle it clean, and over the well-built thrones go and throw

every single table, give the mixing-bowls a proper deep scrub

and the well-made two-handled cups too: and you lot, go fetch water,

get to the spring and haul it back, move it, no dawdling.

Because the suitors won't be gone from the hall for long, trust,

That's what she said, and they heard her loud and clear and got moving.

Twenty of them headed off to the dark-watered spring,

and the others worked away around the house, properly skilled at it.

Then in came the suitors' bold serving men: and they

got back from the spring. And right after them the swineherd showed up

driving in three fat hogs, the absolute pick of the whole lot.

And he left those to graze inside the lovely pens,

then he himself spoke up to Odysseus, all gentle and soft:

or are they still doing you dirty round the halls like before?"

And big-brain Odysseus came back at him with this:

"For real, Eumaeus, I wish the gods would make them pay for the disrespect

these guys keep scheming, all this reckless, no-shame wickedness,

So the two of them were going back and forth like this,

when Melanthius came rolling up close, the goat-herder,

driving in goats that stood out hard from every herd,

dinner for the suitors: and two herdsmen tagged along behind.

then Melanthius himself hit Odysseus with his usual sneer:

"Stranger, you're still here being a nuisance round the house,

begging off the men? You're really not gonna dip out the door?

Yeah no, there's zero chance the two of us are parting ways now

the way you beg: there are other Achaean feasts out there too, you know."

That's what he said, and big-brain Odysseus gave him nothing back,

just shook his head in silence, lowkey cooking up doom underneath.

And third in line, behind them, came Philoetius, a leader of men,

Ferrymen had brought him across, the same ones who carry

everybody else over, whoever pulls up needing the trip.

And he tied his animals up tidy under the echoing porch,

then went and posted up close to the swineherd, asking him:

swineherd? What people does he claim to come

from? Where's his family at, where's his home soil?

Poor guy: still, he's got the build of a proper kingly lord:

but the gods grind down men who've been knocked all over the map,

He spoke, and stepping close he greeted him with his right hand

and finding his voice he hit him with these winged words:

"Welcome, old father, stranger: may good fortune find you

later on at least: for now you're tangled up in all kinds of bad.

you've got zero pity for the men you fathered yourself,

mixing them up in misery and grim, wretched aches.

I started sweating the second I clocked you, eyes welling right up,

remembering Odysseus, since I reckon that man too

if he's even still alive somewhere and clocking the light of the sun.

But if he's already dead and down in the house of Hades,

oh, then woe is me for flawless Odysseus, the one who set me

over his cattle, still tiny, in the land of the Cephallenians.

a herd of broad-browed cattle any better than that:

and other men keep ordering me to drive them in for themselves

to eat: they couldn't care less about the son in the halls,

and they don't tremble at the gods' watching eye: they're already itching

And as for me, this thing keeps spinning round and round

inside my chest: it's properly bad, while the son's still alive,

to head off to another country with the cattle and all,

to foreign men: but it's grimmer still to stay parked here,

And honestly I'd have dipped long ago to some other

overbearing king, since this is straight up past bearing now,

except I keep clinging to hope that poor man might pull up from somewhere

and scatter the suitors all over the halls."

"Cowherd, since you don't come off like a bad or witless man,

and I can clock for myself good sense has reached your mind,

that's exactly why I'll tell you this, and swear a big oath on it:

let Zeus be my witness first, highest and best of the gods,

while you're still right here on the spot, Odysseus is coming home,

and you'll see it with your own two eyes, if that's what you want,

the suitors getting bodied, the ones lording it round this place."

And then the man, the cowherd, came back at him:

then you'd find out real quick what my strength is and what these hands can do."

And in the same breath Eumaeus shot a prayer to all the gods

for the comeback of clever Odysseus to his own home.

So the two of them were going back and forth like this,

for Telemachus: but then a bird came at them on the left,

a high-flying eagle, and it had a trembling dove clamped in its grip.

Then Amphinomus stood up and spoke out among them:

"Lads, this plan of ours isn't gonna run our way at all,

That's what Amphinomus said, and his words sat well with the lot of them.

So they strolled into the halls of godlike Odysseus

and dropped their cloaks down over the chairs and the thrones,

and they got to slaughtering big sheep and plump goats,

then they roasted the innards and passed them round, and the wine

they mixed up in the bowls: and the swineherd handed out the cups.

And Philoetius, a leader of men, dished out the bread to them

in lovely baskets, and Melanthius kept the wine pouring nonstop.

And Telemachus, working every angle, sat Odysseus down

inside the well-built hall, beside the stone threshold,

parking down a rough little stool and a tiny table for him:

and he set a portion of the innards by him, and poured wine

"Sit yourself right here now among the men and sip your wine:

and the sneering and the fists, I'll personally keep clean off you,

off every last one of the suitors, since this house isn't

public property, no, it's Odysseus's, and he won it for me, full stop.

and no fists, so no quarrel or beef ever kicks off in here."

That's what he said, and all of them bit down hard on their lips,

genuinely shook that Telemachus spoke up so bold.

Then Antinous, son of Eupeithes, spoke up among them:

he's clearly talking a big threatening game right at us.

Zeus, son of Kronos, didn't clear it: otherwise by now

we'd have shut him up in the halls, sharp little speaker that he is."

That's what Antinous said: but the kid paid his words zero mind.

through the town: and the long-haired Achaeans gathered up

under the shady grove of Apollo, who strikes from way off.

And once they'd roasted the outer meat and dragged it off the heat,

they divvied up the portions and feasted on a glorious spread.

equal to what they themselves drew: because that's how he'd called it,

Telemachus, the dear son of godlike Odysseus.

But Athena was in no way letting the bold suitors

ease off the heart-aching abuse, so the ache would sink

And there was a man among the suitors who knew zero decency,

Ctesippus was his name, and he kept his home over in Same:

this one, trusting hard in the wealth of his old man,

was courting the wife of Odysseus, gone all this time.

"Hear me out, you bold suitors, while I drop something:

this stranger's had his fair portion a while now, like he should,

an equal one: because it's not nice or right to short-change

the guests of Telemachus, whoever pulls up to these halls.

can pass it on as a tip to the bath-girl, or to some other

servant in the halls of godlike Odysseus."

Saying this he chucked a cow's hoof with his beefy hand,

snatching it from where it sat in the basket: but Odysseus dodged it,

a real grim, savage little grin: and the thing smacked the well-built wall.

And Telemachus dragged Ctesippus right back with these words:

"Ctesippus, that worked out real lucky for you, deep down, no cap:

you didn't tag the stranger, because he dodged your missile himself.

and instead of a wedding your father would've been busy

sorting your funeral, right here on the spot. So nobody show me any

disrespect in this house: because I clock it all now, I know everything,

the good and the worse: before now I was still just a kid, sure.

the sheep getting slaughtered, the wine drunk dry,

the bread too: because it's hard for one man to hold off a whole mob.

But come on, quit doing me dirty out of pure spite:

and if you're now itching to kill me myself with bronze,

to be dead than to keep watching this shameful business forever,

my guests getting knocked about and the serving women

dragged round disgracefully through these lovely halls."

That's what he said, and all of them went dead quiet, not a sound.

"Lads, when something fair gets said, nobody should

fly at it with hostile words and lose their whole cool:

don't be roughing up the stranger or anybody else

of the servants in the halls of godlike Odysseus.

if it sits well with the hearts of the two of them.

As long as your spirit in your chest was still clinging to hope

that clever Odysseus would make it back home,

there was no blame in waiting and holding the suitors off

if Odysseus came back and reached his house again:

but now this much is obvious, the man's not coming home, period.

So come on, go sit beside your mum and lay it out for her straight,

to marry whichever man's the best and brings the most,

eating and drinking, while she keeps another man's house."

And switched-on Telemachus came back at him with this:

"By Zeus, Agelaus, and by the sufferings of my father,

who somewhere far from Ithaca has either died or wanders,

to wed whoever she likes, and I'm throwing in endless gifts on top:

but I'd be ashamed to drive her out of the halls against her will

with a forced command: god forbid that ever go down."

That's what Telemachus said: but among the suitors Pallas Athena

And now they were laughing with jaws that weren't even their own,

and they were eating meat all spattered with blood: and their eyes

were filling right up with tears, and their spirit sensed weeping coming.

And then Theoclymenus, the godlike one, spoke up among them:

are shrouded in night, your faces too, and down below your knees,

wailing has caught fire, your cheeks are streaked raw with tears,

the walls are spattered with blood and the lovely roof-beams too,

the porch is crammed full of ghosts, the courtyard packed with them,

has vanished clean out of the sky, and an evil mist has rolled across."

That's what he said, and all of them laughed at him, sweet and easy.

Then Eurymachus, son of Polybus, kicked off the talking:

"He's lost the whole plot, this stranger who just blew in from somewhere else.

to head for the assembly, since to him it's basically night in here."

And then Theoclymenus, the godlike one, said straight back to him:

"Eurymachus, I'm not asking you for any escorts, none.

I've got eyes and ears and two good feet of my own,

on those I'll head out the door, since I sense an evil coming

for you all, the kind not one of you suitors will dodge

or slip out from under, you who in the halls of godlike Odysseus

keep wronging men and scheming reckless wickedness."

and went to Peiraeus, who took him in with open arms.

And all the suitors, glancing round at one another,

kept needling Telemachus, laughing at his guests.

And one of those overbearing young men would go:

the way you keep some grimy drifter like this one around,

desperate for food and wine, with zero skill at any work

or fighting, just a dead weight on the land, a whole NPC:

and now this other one stood up to play prophet on us.

let's toss these strangers into a many-oared ship

and ship them off to the Sicilians, where they'd fetch you a tidy sum."

That's what the suitors said: but the kid paid their words zero mind,

he just eyed his father in silence, watching always, locked in,

And across from them, having parked her gorgeous chair,

the daughter of Icarius, switched-on Penelope,

was catching every man's words in the halls, taking it all in.

Because, laughing away, they'd thrown together their dinner,

but no supper could ever land more thankless than the one

a goddess and a powerful man were soon about to

set before them: because they'd been the first to scheme foul things.