The Iliad: Book 3

Now with the squadrons marshaled, captains leading each,
the Trojans came with cries and the din of war like wildfowl
when the long hoarse cries of cranes sweep on against the sky

Now closer, closing, front to front in the onset
till Paris sprang from the Trojan forward ranks,
a challenger, lithe, magnificent as a god...

Soon as the warrior Menelaus marked him,
Paris parading there with his big loping strides,
flaunting before the troops, Atrides thrilled
like a lion lighting on some handsome carcass,
lucky to find an antlered stag or wild goat
just as hunger strikes—he rips it, bolts it down,
even with running dogs and lusty hunters rushing him.

Backing into his friendly ranks, he cringed from death
as one who trips on a snake in a hilltop hollow
recoils, suddenly, trembling grips his knees
and pallor takes his cheeks and back he shrinks.

They thought you the bravest champion we could field,
and just because of the handsome luster on your limbs,
but you have no pith, no fighting strength inside you.

What?—is this the man who mustered the oarsmen once,
who braved the seas in his racing deep-sea ships,
trafficked with outlanders, carried off a woman
far from her distant shores, a great beauty
wed to a land of rugged spearmen?

The heart inside you is always tempered hard,
like an ax that goes through wood when a shipwright
cuts out ship timbers with every ounce of skill
and the blade's weight drives the man's stroke.
So the heart inside your chest is never daunted.

When Hector heard that challenge he rejoiced
and right in the no man's land along his lines he strode,
gripping his spear mid-haft, staving men to a standstill.

"Hold back, Argives! Sons of Achaea, stop your salvos!
Look, Hector with that flashing helmet of his—
the man is trying to tell us something now."

The minds of the younger men are always flighty,
but let an old man stand his ground among them,
one who can see the days behind, the days ahead—
that is the best hope for peace, for both our armies.

Long years had brought their fighting days to a halt
but they were eloquent speakers still, clear as cicadas
settled on treetops, lifting their voices through the forest,
rising softly, falling, dying away...

Long years had brought their fighting days to a halt
but they were eloquent speakers still, clear as cicadas
settled on treetops, lifting their voices through the forest,
rising softly, falling, dying away...

Beauty, terrible beauty!
A deathless goddess—so she strikes our eyes!
But still,
ravishing as she is, let her go home in the long ships
and not be left behind...for us and our children
down the years an irresistible sorrow.

Many others afield are much taller, true,
but I have never yet set eyes on one so regal,
so majestic...That man must be a king!

I revere you so, dear father, dread you too—
if only death had pleased me then, grim death,
that day I followed your son to Troy, forsaking
my marriage bed, my kinsmen and my child,
my favorite, now full-grown,
and the lovely comradeship of women my own age.

I revere you so, dear father, dread you too—
if only death had pleased me then, grim death,
that day I followed your son to Troy, forsaking
my marriage bed, my kinsmen and my child,
my favorite, now full-grown,
and the lovely comradeship of women my own age.

You'd think him a sullen fellow or just plain fool.
But when he let loose that great voice from his chest
and the words came piling on like a driving winter blizzard—
then no man alive could rival Odysseus!

I know them all by heart, and I could tell their names…
but two I cannot find, and they're captains of the armies,
Castor breaker of horses and the hardy boxer Polydeuces.

A shudder went shooting through the old man
but he told his men to yoke the team at once.

They promptly obeyed and Priam climbed aboard,
pulling the reins back taut.

Antenor flanked him,
mounting the gleaming car, and both men drove the team
through the Scaean Gates, heading toward the plain.

But if red-haired Menelaus brings down Paris,
the Trojans surrender Helen and all her treasures.
And they pay us reparations fair and fitting,
a price to inspire generations still to come.

And now—
one warrior harnessed burnished armor on his back,
magnificent Paris, fair-haired Helen's consort.

And now—
one warrior harnessed burnished armor on his back,
magnificent Paris, fair-haired Helen's consort.

Lunging at Paris, he grabbed his horsehair crest,
swung him round, started to drag him into Argive lines
and now the braided chin-strap holding his helmet tight
was gouging his soft throat—Paris was choking, strangling.

Now he'd have hauled him off and won undying glory
but Aphrodite, Zeus's daughter quick to the mark,
snapped the rawhide strap, cut from a bludgeoned ox,
and the helmet came off empty in Menelaus' fist.

The goddess reached and tugged at her fragrant robe,
whispering low, for all the world like an old crone,
the old weaver who, when they lived in Lacedaemon,
wove her fine woolens and Helen held her dear.

But Aphrodite rounded on her in fury:
"Don't provoke me—wretched, headstrong girl!
Or in my immortal rage I may just toss you over,
hate you as I adore you now—with a vengeance.
I might make you the butt of hard, withering hate
from both sides at once, Trojans and Achaeans—
then your fate can tread you down to dust!"

Shrouding herself in her glinting silver robes
she went along, in silence.

Wait,
take my advice and call a halt right here:
no more battling with fiery-haired Menelaus,
pitting strength against strength in single combat—
madness. He just might impale you on his spear!