Author notes

254

marcorossi

on Jan. 7, 2023

Cultural reference:


From his right shoulder brandishing aloft
The ashen spear of Peleus, while around
Flash’d his bright armour, dazzling as the glare
Of burning fire, or of the rising sun.
Hector beheld, and trembled at the sight;
Nor dar’d he there await th’ attack, but left
The gates behind, and, terror-stricken, fled.
Forward, with flying foot, Pelides rush’d.
As when a falcon, bird of swiftest flight,
From some high mountain-top, on tim’rous dove
Swoops fiercely down; she, from beneath, in fear,
Evades the stroke; he, dashing through the brake,
Shrill-shrieking, pounces on his destin’d prey;
So, wing’d with desp’rate hate, Achilles flew,
So Hector, flying from his keen pursuit,
Beneath the walls his active sinews plied.
They by the watch-tow’r, and beneath the wall
Where stood the wind-beat fig-tree, rac’d amain
Along the public road, until they reach’d
The fairly-flowing fount whence issu’d forth,
From double source, Scamander’s eddying streams.
One with hot current flows, and from beneath,
As from a furnace, clouds of steam arise;
’Mid summer’s heat the other rises cold
As hail, or snow, or water crystalliz’d;
Beside the fountains stood the washing-troughs
Of well-wrought stone, where erst the wives of Troy
And daughters fair their choicest garments wash’d,
In peaceful times, ere came the sons of Greece.
There rac’d they, one in flight, and one pursuing;
Good he who fled, but better who pursu’d,
With fiery speed; for on that race was stak’d
No common victim, no ignoble ox:
The prize at stake was mighty Hector’s life.
As when the solid-footed horses fly
Around the course, contending for the prize,
Tripod, or woman of her lord bereft;
So rac’d they thrice around the walls of Troy
With active feet; and all the Gods beheld.