Thoughts on Mythology

These are notes from my recent talk on mythology at the Seligmann Center. I pass on my ideas in this raw form, without any attempt to work up an essay, in the belief that some of the ideas may be useful.


1
     The Greek word muthos in Homer has a broad meaning, fundamentally, anything delivered by word of mouth. The term came later to indicate conversation, counsel, the subject of speech, the matter, a purpose, a saying, a rumor; then a fiction or legend.

2
     In contemporary literary use, it is a story not tied to an individual text. Mythology arises as a sort of collective narrative: a body of linked and particularly significant stories that express in symbolic order the world-view of a community. Myth is deeply involved not only with the earliest poetry, but also science, philosophy, religion, and history, in fact all the intellectual disciplines. The definitive authority myths claim is evident in the fact that they often concern the gods or other spiritual beings. Myths are often taken as literal history, though they are also used by writers in self-consciously symbolic ways. Myth fades into legend and other cultural material.

3
     Not every collective narrative is mythic. Historical events are shared by large numbers of people. They may resonate in mythic ways, but the presumptive loyalty is to real events. Jokes lack the vast implications of myths.

4
     I continue to find Northrup Frye’s classification useful.

1) superior in kind to people and to their environment: mythic
2) superior in degree to people and environment: romance
3) superior in degree to people but not to environment: high mimetic (a hero of epic or tragedy, Aristotle’s hero)
4) inferior to the reader or equal: low-mimetic, ironic (realism, comedy)

     Frye notes, “Looking over this table, we see that European fiction, over the last fifteen centuries has moved steadily down this list . . . Something of the same progression can be traced in Classical literature, too.”

5
     In The Mind in the Cave: Consciousness and the Origins of Art David Lewis-Williams analyzes cave paintings and posits a simultaneous birth of language, art, and religion. With the birth of signs came the ability to lie.

6
      Mythic references may be traditional (Homeric hymns, Elder Edda, anthropological texts), literary (Ovid, Shakespeare, Rothenburg), modern (Superman, cowboy hero, Jewish blood guilt, Lincoln), or idiosyncratic (Blake, Yeats, outsider art).

7
     In poetry mythological references may serve to universalize or create group identity (as in the many medieval romances which wither begin or end by invoking the blessing of Christ), to compress (as in Raleigh’s reference to Philomel implying a world of violence in a word), to ironize, (as in Joyce’s Ulysses or the Coens’ O Brother Where Art Thou), or to decorate (as in Herrick’s “Parcae” where Atropos charms rather than frightens).

8
     Approaches to the understanding of myth include:

1) Euhemerism regards myths as distorted accounts of real historical events. Herodotus in his reasonable way, has recourse to this explanation. (On the other hand some ritual theorists would agree with Frye (above), and hold the opposite view: that gods degenerate over the years into myth, then legend (with supernatural apparatus), appearing next as history and finally as comedy.

2) Mythology has often been viewed as a sort of allegory with the gods representing either natural phenomena or concepts. The 19th century Sanskritist Max Müller supported an allegorical theory of myth. Modern variations of this theme include Freudian, Jungian, or other psychological theories.

3) Myths have been viewed as solely functional, often a form of social control. A simple form of this approach would be the vulgar Marxist analyst to whom every myth comments on class relations, but Malinowski took much the same approach.

4) The structural theory states that myths are patterned after the human mind as well as human nature. Claude Levi-Strauss, makes the claim that “myth is language,” and stresses formal play with meaning arising only from contrasts within a pattern, not from individual elements.

5) According to the myth-ritual theory, the existence of myth is tied to ritual. In its most extreme form, this theory claims that myths arose to explain rituals. I am myself fond on the work of James Frazer and the Cambridge School.

6) Myth has been considered the human language for investigating the metaphysical. In this sense myth is much like religion, providing human’s most profound analysis of the cosmos.

7) Myth is a symbolic statement about reality. Each culture defines and defends its assumptions with myth. Myth tends toward the encyclopedic, offering seamless explanations and prescriptions for the significant passages of life.

9
     To test these ideas with texts, I followed with this brief anthology of poem’s mentioning Aphrodite.

from Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite (my translation)

She went to Paphos -- Cyprus -- where her
aromatic altar and her temple stood,
and she went in and shut the shining doors. 60
The graces then anointed her with oil
such as blooms on bodies of the gods.
(The oil was sweet, ambrosial, smelled so fine!)
Then laughter-loving Aphrodite donned
fine clothes of golden fabric on her flesh. 65
She left sweet-smelling Cyprus then for Troy
(fast she flew and high, the clouds her road),
to spring-rich Ida, beast-land, came she then,
she went through hills right to his home and after her
came bright-eyed lions, fawning grey-furred wolves 70
and bears, fast leopards ravenous for deer,
and then her heart rejoiced at seeing them
and to their hearts she tossed hot lust; they paired
in twos and mated in the shade,


Thomas Wyatt (the first stanza of an untitled poem)

Though this port : and I thy servaunt true,
And thou thy self doist cast thy bemes from hye
From thy chieff howse, promising to renew
Both Joye and eke delite, behold yet how that I,
Bannisshed from my blisse, carefully do crye,
"Helpe now, Citherea, my lady dere,
"My ferefull trust," en vogant la galere.


from Shakespeare’s Venus and Adonis

Over one arm the lusty courser's rein
Under her other was the tender boy, 32
Who blush'd and pouted in a dull disdain,
With leaden appetite, unapt to toy;
She red and hot as coals of glowing fire
He red for shame, but frosty in desire. 36

The studded bridle on a ragged bough
Nimbly she fastens;—O! how quick is love:—
The steed is stalled up, and even now
To tie the rider she begins to prove: 40
Backward she push'd him, as she would be thrust,
And govern'd him in strength, though not in lust . . .

'Fondling,' she saith, 'since I have hemm'd thee here
Within the circuit of this ivory pale,
I'll be a park, and thou shalt be my deer;
Feed where thou wilt, on mountain or in dale: 232
Graze on my lips, and if those hills be dry,
Stray lower, where the pleasant fountains lie.

'Within this limit is relief enough,
Sweet bottom-grass and high delightful plain, 236
Round rising hillocks, brakes obscure and rough,
To shelter thee from tempest and from rain:
Then be my deer, since I am such a park; 239
No dog shall rouse thee, though a thousand bark.'


A Hymn to Venus and Cupid (Herrick)

SEA-BORN goddess, let me be
By thy son thus grac'd and thee;
That whene'er I woo, I find
Virgins coy but not unkind.
Let me when I kiss a maid
Taste her lips so overlaid
With love's syrup, that I may,
In your temple when I pray,
Kiss the altar and confess
There's in love no bitterness.

Final stanza from Un Voyage à Cythère (Baudelaire)
On your isle, O Venus! I found upright only
A symbolic gallows from which hung my image...
O! Lord! give me the strength and the courage
To contemplate my body and soul without loathing!
Dans ton île, ô Vénus! je n'ai trouvé debout
Qu'un gibet symbolique où pendait mon image...
— Ah! Seigneur! donnez-moi la force et le courage
De contempler mon coeur et mon corps sans dégoût!

Venus Anadyomène (Rimbaud)

As from a green zinc coffin, a woman’s
Head with brown hair heavily pomaded
Emerges slowly and stupidly from an old bathtub,
With bald patches rather badly hidden;

Then the fat gray neck, broad shoulder-blades
Sticking out; a short back which curves in and bulges;
Then the roundness of the buttocks seems to take off;
The fat under the skin appears in slabs:

The spine is a bit red; and the whole thing has a smell
Strangely horrible; you notice especially
Odd details you’d have to see with a magnifying glass…

The buttocks bear two engraved words: CLARA VENUS;
—And that whole body moves and extends its broad rump
Hideously beautiful with an ulcer on the anus.

Comme d’un cercueil vert en fer blanc, une tête
De femme à cheveux bruns fortement pommadés
D’une vieille baignoire émerge, lente et bête,
Avec des déficits assez mal ravaudés;

Puis le col gras et gris, les larges omoplates
Qui saillent; le dos court qui rentre et qui ressort;
Puis les rondeurs des reins semblent prendre l’essor;
La graisse sous la peau paraît en feuilles plates:

L’échine est un peu rouge, et le tout sent un goût
Horrible étrangement; on remarque surtout
Des singularités qu’il faut voir à la loupe…

Les reins portent deux mots gravés: CLARA VENUS;
—Et tout ce corps remue et tend sa large croupe
Belle hideusement d’un ulcère à l’anus.


An autumn morning in Shokoku-ji (Snyder)

Last night watching the Pleiades,
Breath smoking in the moonlight,
Bitter memory like vomit
Choked my throat.
I unrolled a sleeping bag
On mats on the porch
Under thick autumn stars.
In dream you appeared
(Three times in nine years)
Wild, cold, and accusing.
I woke shamed and angry:
The pointless wars of the heart.
Almost dawn. Venus and Jupiter.
The first time I have
Ever seen them close.


Birth of Eventually Venus (MacLeish)

Cast up by the sea
By the seventh wave
Beyond the sea reach
In the rubble of weed and
Wet twig
The not yet amphibious
Animalcula
Gasps and wiggles on the beach
Gathering her long gold hair about her
And gazing with pure eyes
Upon the unknown world.

Venus Over the Desert (Williams)

If I do not sin, she said, you shall not
walk in long gowns down stone corridors.
There is no reprieve where there is no fall-
ing off. I lie in your beds all night, from
me you wake and go about your tasks. My flesh
clings to your bones. What use is holiness
unless it affirms my perfections, my breasts,
my thighs which you part, shaking, and my lips
the door to my pleasures? Sin, you call it,
but there cannot be cold unless the heat
has bred it, how can you know otherwise? Love
comfort me in the face of my defeats! Poor
monks, you think you are gentle but I tell you
you kill as sure as shot kills a bird flying.

The Death of Venus (also titled the Birth of Venus) (Creeley)

I dreamt her sensual proportions
had suffered sea-change,

that she was a porpoise
a sea-beast rising lucid from the mist.

The sound of waves killed speech
But there were gestures –

of my own, it was to call her closer,
of hers, she snorted and filled her lungs with water,

then sank, to the bottom,
and, looking down, clear it was, like crystal,

there I saw her.

Aphrodite’s Bed: Love in the Homeric Hymn

     Among the glories of Greek poetry is its poignant fascination with pleasure, whether of the athletic field, the table or the bed (including, indeed, true love). Unlike certain other traditions that insist on angling after a share in eternity, the Greeks seized what beauty they found before their eyes, making of it a profoundly ambivalent ideal, its pleasure excruciatingly heightened by its transience. Their vision was elaborated in one of the grandest and most precise mythological systems preserved in words. The so-called Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite, one of the oldest texts in the European tradition, deploys an array of mythological figures to define all-too-human love, a love that proves no less transcendent for its limitation in time.


I.
     The opposition of time and eternity is reflected in that between the human and divine worlds. In the Hymn these dualities are exploded and explored through the theme of threatening or enervating intercourse of a mortal with a goddess. The theme of is, of course, very common in literature and folklore from Ishtar's attempted seduction of Gilgamesh through tales of succubi in medieval tail-rhyme romance to Keats' "Belle Dame." In the twentieth century the search for heavenly connections fraught with danger continues in Lawrence, Henry Miller, Norman Mailer and many others and remains animated, more or less subtly, by the supernatural.
     In nearly all these stories – the mythological and the “realistic” alike -- the motif is suggestive of the following themes: the numinous nature of sexuality itself; a simultaneously heightened vision of mortality and of the confusion or, indeed, unity of the impulses toward life and death in the psyche; and, finally, a sense of man's ultimate passivity and helplessness before the currents of fate. In spite of the pessimistic coloration of these latter themes, it in significant that a story of divine-human intercourse deals with a bridging of the gap, however temporary or even disastrous for the participants, between mundane reality and perfection.
     In the “Hymn to Aphrodite” the transcendental character of sexuality is expressed in several ways. First, it is all but omnipotent, overmastering even Zeus. Secondly, human figures, when viewed as sexual objects are explicitly described as god-like, shining, divine (1. 55 and 1. 86 are two of many examples). Aphrodite and Ganymede are alike called "a marvel to see" (θαῦμα ἰδέσθαι, l. 90 and l. 205). The clothing and ornament of the beloved assumes likewise a magical glow reflecting the onlooker's aroused energies.

     As for the vision of mortality that is an intrinsic part of commingling with the divine, it is necessary here only to mention that, upon discovering what he has done, Anchises is not delighted at the grace that has descended, but rather he fears for his life. (Topic II discusses other negative aspects of the encounter in more detail.)
     The entire poem stresses passivity and helplessness. People are snatched by gods (Ganymede, Tithonus, Aphrodite in her deceitful narration, Anchises himself in a figurative sense); they are enwrapped by age (1. 244); eros "takes" them (1. 91). Both Anchises and Aphrodite are compelled to act as they do. Nowhere is human life or character portrayed as a self-made entity for which one assumes responsibility.
     Yet it is worth recalling at this point that the entire poem is based on the ecstasy Anchises experiences. However disillusioned he is in the end, Anchises has felt a real though momentary restoration of Edenic conditions. Though he may be shaken, he must be also inspired.


II.
     The entire poem is structured by the design of its central theme -- the mingling of opposites: the human and the divine, heaven and earth, pleasure and fear, love and cruelty. Both Aphrodite and Anchises act with powerful and opposing inclinations contesting within their minds. Aphrodite acts with single-minded intensity, but once she has shared Anchises' bed, she is overcome with shame and distress, declaring "great has been my madness" (ἐπεὶ μάλα πολλὸν ἀάσθην, 1. 253). Anchises is apprehensive upon first seeing her (1. 83), submits to her with qualifications and misgivings (1. 145-151) as well as enthusiasm, and is again frightened when she reveals her true form (1. 182), Each then, feels what behaviorists call an approach-avoidance conflict, though the outcome is never in doubt. But the ambiguity of their motives goes beyond this doubt, for the love and desire they feel are themselves strangely compounded with malice and deceit. Zeus tosses lust to Aphrodite out of his resentment of her apparently stable will. She, in turn, tosses lust to Anchises in a cruelly calculating and manipulative manner. After lying to him and using him, she confronts him in a chilling and imperious manner "Up, son of Dardanus!" (ὄρσεο, Δαρδανίδη, l. 177) and she leaves him with threats and suspicions (1. 281-290). For his part, Anchises is self-absorbed to the point of narcissism. The reader's original glimpse of him suggests this quality that made him vulnerable and the appropriate victim for Aphrodite as he is seen while "all the others" are at work, strolling up and down alone, playing on his kithara (1. 79-80). Love appears in the poem as an instrument of manipulation, a leash by which another's ego may be led about.
     The contradiction is epitomized in Aphrodite's epithet Φιλομμηδής. The term expresses at once her association with joy, pleasure, and beauty and with heartless and sadistic mockery. It is first used (1. 17) in speaking of those whom she cannot "tame," "ensnare," or "bend." It occurs next (1. 49) in a context of her ridiculing all those whom she can render foolish and powerless by her wiles. It is also used in the moment (1. 155) of mounting the great bed. So it bears a burden of meaning at once sinister and intimate, welcome and frightful, the smile of a lover melting into the harsh grin of a victorious opponent.
     Another highly memorable image of the contradictory sides of love is the familiar one of wild beasts. The haunting and beautiful lines describing Aphrodites approach to Anchises’ home surrounded by predatory animals (1. 69-74) suggest the wild, uncontrollable lust she feels and also its devouring, vampiristic quality. The bears and lions appear again on Anchises' bed, trophies of his earlier victories in subjugating wild natural forces (1 159). These animals, though potent and attractive, are merciless and driven.
     These tensions precipitate a fall that is quite similar to the Biblical fall. Anchises, who had been inhabiting an idyllic but static rural world, finds himself the progenitor of a turbulent and tragic, but vital and energetic line. We see the Trojan War in the future, in which the erotic debacle is moved from myth to legend as it advances in time. This prediction, which foreshadows in fact the whole Greek world of those who originally heard the poem, clearly places the flaw that caused the fall into the category of a felix culpa in that it makes history possible. As Empedocles and Freud said, love and strife make the world move.


III.
     Examining the exceptions to Aphrodite's rule catalogued near the poem's beginning, one may see her defined negatively and better understand her attractions and her dangers. Athena, Hestia, and Artemis are mentioned as exempt from Aphrodite's sway. It is significant that the opposition implied is by no means between pleasure and reality principles. Athena is associated with war, Hestia with domesticity, and Artemis with the hunt, the dance, and civic life. What links these goddesses is the social nature of their functions. War insures a profound and emotional social solidarity. The ties forged in family life are at least as significant for the community as a whole as for the nuclear family as a separate unit. In the case of Artemis one might view the hunt as representing collective food production (hunting communities generally share their prey), while the dance is, though ecstatic, a ritual confirmation of group assumptions. Thus, the third element associated with Artemis, that of "orderly towns," which may have originally appeared somewhat out of place when juxtaposed with the wild cries of the hunt and the excitement of the dance, is actually fully of a piece with these other terms. Love in opposition to them is seen as a selfish, a paradoxically solitary obsession. One may act with devotion, determination, or bravery in response to circumstances, but erotic passion is exclusively self-justifying. That is the reason it carries the potential for such disorder, and why it is viewed with as much awe and fear as delight. The mutual dance of vulnerability and aggression that Aphrodite brings is a threat to the social order of self-defense, stable families, and group activities represented by the other three goddesses.

IV.
     The tales of Ganymede and Tithonus, cited by Aphrodite as precedents in her apologia, further develop the concept of love in the poem. Neither suggests the delights of sexuality; those are assumed. What they do stress is the quantifying, the calculating quality of love that grows naturally from the solipsistic concerns of the lovers. In the case of Ganymede, almost no space is given to the putative point Aphrodite is making the fact that Zeus himself shares in the failings of the flesh. Nearly the whole passage is devoted to explaining how his father was pleased to be given some fine horses in exchange for his son, surely a cynical and disturbing comment on what Ganymede meant to Zeus and to the other heavenly banqueters. Even worse, because of its horror and inevitability is the story of Tithonus. Here the theme is the temporal limitation of love. The necessity for passic to flag and flesh to decline is presented in such a frightening way that when Eo closes the doors on the old babbler in his one-room nursing home, the reader feels quite sympathetic to her desire to avoid seeing, at least, the spectre of loathsome age. Though on earth, one's lover may age also, the leering faces (Φιλομμηδής) of youth will reproach him nonetheless.

V.
     Even so merciless a dissection of the pitfalls of love does not suffice for the cautionary burden of the poem. The hymn to a goddess that is really the story of that goddess’ defeat and of the tragedy of human existence closes with the curious, almost disorienting device characteristic of the prosodion form in the "Homeric hymns."

 'Take heed: refrain and name me not, but have regard to the anger of the gods.”  When the goddess had so spoken, she soared up to windy heaven.  Hail, goddess, queen of well-builded Cyprus! with you have I begun; now I will turn me to another hymn.

ἴσχεο μηδ᾽ ὀνόμαινε, θεῶν δ᾽ ἐποπίζεο μῆνιν./ ὣς εἰποῦσ᾽ ἤιξε πρὸς οὐρανὸν ἠνεμόεντα./  χαῖρε, θεά, κύπροιο ἐυκτιμένης μεδέουσα:/ σεῦ δ᾽ ἐγὼ ἀρξάμενος μεταβήσομαι ἄλλον ἐς ὕμνον.

This anticlimactic ending, so immediately unsatisfying, has a peculiar effect of tossing the mythic action that has preceded it into a larger context, a swirl, a matrix far grander than the events just narrated, which had seemed all-important. The poets' mention of turning to other gods reminds the reader that on Olympus as on earth, psychic quantities of various coloration determine events by their mutual interrelationship and balancing of tensions. It is ill-advised to put all one's eggs in one basket or all one's votive offerings before a single altar. The formula may here have roots in a genuine function as prelude, but as evolved it seems to be as well a prudent recognition of the multiplicity of the gods and a reminder that no single force can guide one's mind toward integration and wholeness. It is also reminiscent of the statue to the unknown god (present in today's Africa as well as in St. Paul's Athens) that granted the powers even of those potencies of which one is not aware.

Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite

     As is readily obvious, the translation is in rough form. I am attempting to make every line in English correspond to the line in Greek. I believe a basically colloquial language is the only one capable of being read in serious poetry today, though it is important to twist it with rhetoric and ornament to keep it alive. I used a basic five beat line, generally iambic, stretching it fairly often to six beats when the content implied some high moment or sustained tone. The line sounds almost but not quite natural in English. Since the lines are somewhat longer than ordinary, conversational breath units, they sound vaguely dignified and this impression is reinforced by the historic uses of English blank verse. 

     The fact that the originals were written in a more highly artificial language might tend to favor a similarly artificial language for translation. But it is my contention and the common practice of classical translators today as a whole that the subject, style, and syntax of a poem like the Hymn are themselves sufficiently removed from colloquial realms that it would be a mistake to further intensify the effect. The lengthy semantic units of the lines allow the reader to linger lovingly on each of a long series of images or ideas, making the poem always clearly representing a special category of experience. (I think it would be tempting to break each line into tiny word groups and give each a separate space on the page, rather like bits in a Creeley poem, but the effect cannot be sustained for the large handfuls of meaning that each line of the hymn conveys and it would shortly become tedious and annoying.) 

     I like to use as many ordinary expressions as possible, but an occasional admixture of the vulgar or the formal can sometimes help to remind the reader that the poem ranges over the whole of experience rather than being confined to specified reservations.

Hymn to Aphrodite 

Muse, declare the deeds of golden Aphrodite, 

the Cypriot who stirs sweet lust among the gods, 

who's broken to her yoke the tribes of men, 

flying birds, and all the wild beasts — 

those that live on land or in the sea — 

all love crowned Cytherea's works. But there 

are three she cannot win with wiles: bright-eyed 

Athena, aegis-bearing Zeus' child, 

does not delight in golden Aphrodite’s deeds; 

Athena's love's for war and Ares’ work, 

for fights and combat and for well-made crafts, 

for at the start she taught earth's men to make 

chariots and war cars worked in bronze, and then, 

she teaches, too, the soft-skinned girls at home, 

puts in their minds most glorious skills; 

nor does laughter-loving Aphrodite 

control the loud resounding Artemis 

of golden arrows who loves bows and hunts 

and mountain beasts and loves the lyre and dance 

and piercing cries and shady groves and just men's towns; 

nor does the upright maiden Hestia, 

crooked-counselled Cronos' first-born child 

(and also youngest by the will of Zeus) 

love Love (Apollo and Poseidon courted her 

but she said no and firmly she refused, 

she swore a mighty oath which she upheld — 

touching aegis-holding father Zeus's head, 

the godly one, vowed virgin to remain — 

Father Zeus gave her instead high fame, 

and so she sits in hearts of homes and takes 

the cream; she's honored in the temples, too, 

and mortals make her senior of their gods. 

Aphrodite's wiles won't win these three, 

but Aphrodite captures all the rest, 

the blessed gods and also mortal men. 

Even thundering Zeus is led astray 

the greatest and the one with greatest fame, 

even his shrewd heart, when she should wish, 

is easily led with mortals to make love 

and his wife and sister Hera never knows. 

(She whose form is fairest far of all, 

most glorious of the gods whom Rhea bore 

with sly Cronos -- all-knowing Zeus took her 

and made of her his sage and prudent wife). 

Then to Aphrodite Zeus tossed sweet desire 

to mix with mortals so that soon she could 

not keep away from beds of men. So how 

could laughing Aphrodite then make mock 

among the gods and softly smile and say 

that she had joined the gods with mortal girls 

(who bear the sons of gods who're doomed to die) 

and goddesses she'd mixed with mortal men. 

Zeus threw then sweetest lust into her heart, 

lust for Anchises tending cows on Ida's 

spring-rich mountain peaks -- he looked a god. 

Seeing him then laughing Aphrodite felt

a new desire and fear then strike her heart. 

She went to Paphos -- Cyprus -- then where her 

aromatic altar and her temple stood, 

and she went in and shut the shining doors. 

The graces then anointed her with oil 

such as blooms on bodies of the gods. 

(The oil was sweet, ambrosial, smelled so fine!) 

Then laughter-loving Aphrodite donned 

fine clothes of golden fabric on her flesh. 

She left sweet-smelling Cyprus then for Troy 

(fast she flew and high, the clouds her road), 

then she came to spring-rich Ida, full of beasts, 

she went through hills right to his home and after 

her came bright-eyed lions, fawning grey-furred 

wolves and bears and speedy leopards after deer, 

and then her heart rejoiced at seeing them 

and to their hearts she tossed hot lust; they paired 

in twos and mated in the shade. and then 

she came into the sturdy house and found 

him left alone within that place, Anchises, man 

made great by god's own grace. All of the rest 

had driven herds to grassy spots and he 

was left alone at home to walk and pluck 

his lyre with piercing notes. Zeus’ daughter Aphro-

dite stood before him very like a girl 

in size and form and told him as he eyed 

her not to fear. Anchises looked at her 

and was amazed to see her form and size 

and shining clothes. She wore a robe outshining 

fire's glow, so fine and gold and richly worked. 

A marvel to behold!  It shone like moonshine 

all about her breasts and she wore twisted armlets, 

calyx earrings bright and round her tender 

throat fine necklaces.  Then Eros seized Anchises 

and he said "You're welcome, queen, blest one,

to this house, be you Artemis or Leto, 

golden Aphrodite, noble Themis,  

bright-eyed Athena or maybe you're one 

among the Graces, go with gods and whom 

we know don't die or nymphs who live on lovely 

mountain tops where rivers start and grassy meadows grow. 

On a peak with prospects all about I'll build 

an altar for you where I'll leave rich gifts 

all through the year and you can smile on me, 

make me great among the Trojan men, 

make my offspring strong and as for me 

let me live long and see the shining sun – 

then prosperous I'd come to age's door." 

Zeus' child, Aphrodite, answered him, 

"Most glorious of earth-born men, know I'm 

not divine — why think I’m like a god. 

I'm mortal and my mother was of earth. 

My father's famous Otreus — you know 

of him, he rules all well-walled Phrygia, 

but I can speak your tongue as well as mine.

My nurse at home was Trojan, she took me 

a baby from my mother's care. That's twhy

I learned your speech so well. I danced for noisy 

Artemis of golden shafts, the gold-wand-

holding Argus-killer grabbed me — we played, 

the nymphs, and much sought after girls and then 

a countless crowd encircled us, then gold-wand-

holding Argus-killer seized me and he took 

me over farms of mortal men and land 

untenanted, untilled where raw-meat-eating beasts 

roam shaded spots It seemed my feet would not

touch the fertile earth. He told me I 

should be Anchises’ wife, and from our bed 

would come forth brilliant sons, the offspring from us two

would shine most bright. The mighty Argus-slayer 

told me this and then he mounted up 

to join the gods, and I came here for fate 

is on me strong. I beg of you by Zeus 

and by your parents (who must be good or they'd 

have no such son) o take this virgin then, 

unversed in love. Your father must meet me,

your prudent mother and your noble sibs.

I'll be no bad addition, rather good. 

Quick, send the fast-horsed Phrygian folk 

to tell my father and my mourning mother. 

They'll send you woven clothes and heaps of gold. 

These many shining things are yours with me. 

You must give then a lovely wedding feast, 

well-liked by men and by the deathless gods. 

Having talked, she tossed his heart sweet lust. 

Eros seized Anchises and he said, "If you 

are mortal and your mother too, famed Otreus 

your father as you say, if godly herald 

Hermes brought you here, if you’re to be 

my wife for life, then there’s no god or mortal man 

can hold me back till I have lain with you 

in love. Right now Apollo the far-darter

could loose pain’s arrows from his silver bow — 

I would go to hell, my godlike girl, 

after having mounted to your bed. 

He took her hand and laughter-loving Aphrodite 

looked off with pretty eyes downcast, and moved 

toward the well-made bed spread with soft clothes 

for him. For blankets they had skins of bears 

and of loud-roaring lions, too,  that he 

had killed himself on mountain heights. And when 

they'd mounted to the well-made bed, he first 

took off her twisted armlets, pins, her calyx 

earrings, and her necklaces. He loosed her belt 

and stripped her shining clothes and laid them on 

a silver-studded seat. Then — by the will 

of gods and destiny, the goddess and 

the man made love (he didn't realize). But at 

the time when cows and hardy sheep turn back 

from flowered fields for home then Aphrodite 

dressed herself and poured out sweet and soundest sleep 

on Anchises. And when the bright divinity 

was dressed, she stood beside the bed and then

her head touched ceiling, from her goddess' cheeks 

there shone a beauty that befits crowned Cytherea -- waking him she said, "Get up, o son of Dardanus! Why sleep? And think, if now I look the same 

as when your eyes looked on and saw me first 

before? And quickly he awoke and looked 

at her, at Aphrodite's throat and lovely eyes 

and much afraid he turned his eyes aside 

and pulled his cloak up high to hide his face 

and speaking winged words entreated her, 

"Goddess, when I saw you first, I knew you were divine, 

but you deceived me then. By aegis-holding Zeus 

I beg of you don't leave me now to live 

a cursed life! Take pity! He who beds 

a god is never healthy after that." 

Then Zeus' daughter Aphrodite spoke, 

"Anchises, noblest of all mortal men, 

take heart and don't be overcome by fear. 

You needn't think you'll suffer harm from me 

or other gods for we have love for you.

You shall have a son who'll rule in Troy. His children's 

children, too, who are to come. His name shall be 

Aeneas since I was filled with awful shame 

to lie with man. (Yet your line always comes 

the nearest gods in form and shape of any men). 

Wise Zeus he grabbed the blond Ganymede, 

(his beauty was so great) and took him up 

to pour the drinks in Zeus's house for gods. 

A marvel and the gods all honor him. 

He pours red nectar from a golden bowl. 

But Tros felt endless pain then not to know 

to where the wondrous wind had borne his boy 

so always then he mourned and every day 

till pitying Zeus paid him back for his son -- 

high-stepping horses such as carry gods. 

Those were a gift and then Zeus told the Guide, 

the Argus-killer, to inform the man 

his son would live like deathless, ageless gods. 

And when Tros heard this news from Zeus he wept 

no more but in his heart rejoiced and joyous rode 

his stormy-footed steeds. So Tithonos 

was snatched by golden Dawn and he was mortal yet 

was like a god, and she asked dark-cloud Cronos’ 

son if he might be immortal, live throughout 

all time and Zeus consented and fulfilled 

her wish. So childish then was venerable Dawn. 

She didn't ask for youth with no old age 

so while he had his charming youth he lived 

with golden-throned Dawn the early born 

delighting at earth's end by Ocean's stream, 

but when the first grey hairs began to grow 

on his fair head and on his noble chin, 

the venerable Dawn kept from his bed 

although she still looked after him at home, 

gave him ambrosia, food, and finest clothes. 

But when he was oppressed with loathsome age, 

he could not walk or lift his limbs, it seemed 

to her heart then the wisest thing to lay 

him down and close the shining doors. There he 

just babbles and his strength is gone which once 

he had in limber limbs. I would not have 

you deathless in that way always to live 

among the gods, but if you could preserve 

your present form and shape and could be called 

my mate, sorrow would not wrap my prudent heart. 

But you will soon be seized by stark old age 

which merciless stands next to every man 

destructive, wretched, hated by the gods. 

The gods will now reproach me thanks to you 

every day and always due to you. 

They used to fear my comments and my craft 

for I could mate them all with mortals too. 

Thus I made my mind subject them all, 

but now my words will sound with no such strength 

among the gods for much I've been misled. 

Most wretchedly my mind has gone astray. 

Beneath my belt a child I've made with man, 

and when that child first sees the light of sun,

the mountain nymphs full-breasted can take him. 

(Those nymphs are neither men nor gods but live 

quite long and eat immortal food and dance 

in circles fair and fast among the gods and Sileni 

and Argus-killer eagle-eyed can mate 

with them in lovely caves. And when they're born 

then pines or bright-topped oaks grow up upon 

the fertile earth so fine and flourish standing 

on steep mountain peaks, and men know these 

are sacred precincts then and never mortal cuts 

the trees with ax. But when the Moira Death 

stands very near then those fine trees will wither still. 

Their bark then rots about them and boughs fall. 

The nymph and tree leave sunlight then at once. 

The nymphs shall keep my child and care for him, 

and when he's reached the age of charming youth 

the goddesses will show him then to you 

and so that I can tell you all I want, 

I'll bring the child here when he is five 

and when you've seen this boy (a joyful sight 

for godlike he will be) then bring him quick 

to windy Ilion and if mortals ask 

you who it was who got your own dear child 

beneath her belt, you must be sure to tell 

them as I bid -- say that his mother is 

a flowery nymph, one who lives in forests of this hill, but if you boast and say a foolish thing and say you lay with well crowned Cytherea, angry Zeus will throw a thunderbolt. 

I’ve told you all so heed what I have said. 

Keep yourself from talk, respect god's wrath. 

Then she mounted up the windy sky. 

Hail goddess, queen of Cyprus strong! I started out 

            with you and now shall turn.