{"id":2985,"date":"2013-07-13T01:45:08","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:45:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=2985"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:45:08","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:45:08","slug":"29-two-poems-in-quantitative-hexameters-contd-vol-02-collected-poems","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/03-cwsa\/02-collected-poems\/29-two-poems-in-quantitative-hexameters-contd-vol-02-collected-poems","title":{"rendered":"-29_Two Poems in Quantitative Hexameters – CONTD.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\n\n
\n

 <\/td>\n

\n<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\tBOOK II<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tThe Book of the Statesman<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nNow from his cycle sleepless and vast round the dance of the earth-globe<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tGold Hyperion rose in the wake of the dawn like the eyeball<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFlaming of God revealed by his uplifted luminous eyelid.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTroy he beheld and he viewed the transient labour of mortals.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAll her marble beauty and pomp were laid bare to the heavens.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSunlight streamed into Ilion waking the voice of her gardens,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAmorous seized on her ways, lived glad in her plains and her pastures,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tKissed her leaves into brightness of green. As a lover the last time<\/span><\/p>\n

\nYearns to the beauty desired that again shall not wake to his kisses,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSo over Ilion doomed leaned the yearning immense of the sunrise.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nShe like a wordless marble memory dreaming for ever<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLifted the gaze of her perishable immortality sunwards.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAll her human past aspired in the clearness eternal,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTemples of Phryx and Dardanus touched with the gold of the morning,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nColumns triumphant of Ilus, domes of their greatness enamoured,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tStones that intended to live; and her citadel climbed up to heaven<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWhite like the soul of the Titan Laomedon claiming his kingdoms,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWatched with alarm by the gods as he came. Her bosom maternal<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThrilled to the steps of her sons and a murmur began in her high-roads.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLife renewed its ways which death and sleep cannot alter,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLife that pursuing her boundless march to a goal which we know not,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tEver her own law obeys, not our hopes, who are slaves of her heart-beats.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThen as now men walked in the round which the gods have decreed them<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tEagerly turning their eyes to the lure and the tool and the labour.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nChained is their gaze to the span in front, to the gulfs they are blinded<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMeant for their steps. The seller opened his shop and the craftsman<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBent o’er his instruments handling the work he never would finish,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBusy as if their lives were for ever, today in its evening<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSure of tomorrow. The hammers clanged and the voice of the markets<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWaking desired its daily rumour. Nor only the craftsman,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOnly the hopes of the earth, but the hearts of her votaries kneeling<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCame to her marble shrines and upraised to our helpers eternal<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMissioned the prayer and the hymn or silent, subtly adoring<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tVentured upwards in incense. Loud too the clash of the cymbals<\/span><\/p>\n

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\n

\nFilled all the temples of Troy with the cry of our souls to the azure.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPrayers breathed in vain and a cry that fell back with Fate for its answer!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nChildren laughed in her doorways; joyous they played, by their mothers<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSmiled on still, but their tender bodies unknowing awaited<\/span><\/p>\n

\nGrecian spearpoints sharpened by Fate for their unripe bosoms,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTasks of the slave in Greece. Like bees round their honey-filled dwellings<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMurmuring swarmed to the well-heads the large-eyed daughters of Troya,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tDeep-bosomed, limbed like the gods, 
\n\t\t\t\u2014  glad faces of old that were sentient<\/span><\/p>\n

\nRapturous flowers of the soul, bright bodies that lived under darkness<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tNobly massed of their locks like day under night made resplendent,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nDaughters divine of the earth in the ages when heaven was our father.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThey round Troy’s well-heads flowerlike satisfied morn with their beauty<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOr in the river baring their knees to the embrace of the coolness<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tDipped their white feet in the clutch of his streams, in the haste of Scamander,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLingering this last time with laughter and talk of the day and the morrow<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLeaned to the hurrying flood. All his swiftnesses raced down to meet them,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nCrowding his channel with dancing billows and turbulent murmurs.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tXanthus primaeval met these waves of our life in its passing<\/span><\/p>\n

\nEven as of old he had played with Troy’s ancient fair generations<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMingling his deathless voice with the laughter and joy of their ages,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLaughter of dawns that are dead and a joy that the earth has rejected.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tStill his whispering trees remembered their bygone voices.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHast thou forgotten, O river of Troy? Still, still we can hear them<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tNow, if we listen long in our souls, the bygone voices.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nEarth in her fibres remembers, the breezes are stored with our echoes.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOver the stone-hewn steps for their limpid orient waters<\/span><\/p>\n

\nJoyous they leaned and they knew not yet of the wells of Mycenae,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tDrew not yet from Eurotas the jar for an alien master,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMixed not Peneus yet with their tears. From the clasp of the current<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tNow in their groups they arose and dispersed through the streets and the
\nbyways,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTurned from the freedom of earth to the works and the joy of the hearthside,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLightly they rose and returned through the lanes of the wind-haunted city<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSwaying with rhythmical steps while the anklets jangled and murmured.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSilent temples saw them passing; you too, O houses<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBuilt with such hopes by mortal man for his transient lodging;<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFragrant the gardens strewed on dark tresses their white-smiling jasmines<\/span><\/p>\n

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\n

<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\nDropped like a silent boon of purity soft from the branches:<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tFlowers by the wayside were budding, cries flew winged round the
\ntree-tops.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBright was the glory of life in Ilion city of Priam.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThrice to the city the doom-blast published its solemn alarum;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBlast of the trumpets that call to assembly clamoured through Troya<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThrice and were still. From garden and highway, from palace and temple<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTurned like a steed to the trumpet, rejoicing in war and ambition,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nGathered alert to the call the democracy hated of heaven.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tFirst in their ranks upbearing their age as Atlas his heavens,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nEagle-crested, with hoary hair like the snow upon Ida,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIlion’s senators paced, Antenor and wide-browed Anchises,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAthamas famous for ships and the war of the waters, Tryas<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tStill whose name was remembered by Oxus the orient river,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAstyoches and Ucalegon, dateless Pallachus, Aetor,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAspetus who of the secrets divine knew all and was silent,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAscanus, Iliones, Alcesiphron, Orus, Aretes.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tNext from the citadel came with the voice of the heralds before him<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPriam and Priam’s sons, Aeneas leonine striding,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tFollowed by the heart of a nation adoring her Penthesilea.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAll that was noble in Troy attended the regal procession<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMarching in front and behind and the tramp of their feet was a rhythm<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTuned to the arrogant fortunes of Ilion ruled by incarnate<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tDemigods, Ilus and Phryx and Dardanus, Tros of the conquests,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTros and far-ruling Laomedon who to his soul’s strong labour<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tDrew down the sons of the skies and was served by the ageless immortals.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nInto the agora vast and aspirant besieged by its columns<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBathed and anointed they came like gods in their beauty and grandeur.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLast like the roar of the winds came trampling the surge of the people.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tClamorous led by a force obscure to its ultimate fatal<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSession of wrath the violent mighty democracy hastened;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThousands of ardent lives with the heart yet unslain in their bosoms<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLifted to heaven the voice of man and his far-spreading rumour.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSinging the young men with banners marched in their joyous processions,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTrod in martial measure or dancing with lyrical paces<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tChanted the glory of Troy and the wonderful deeds of their fathers.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nInto the columned assembly where Ilus had gathered his people,<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 357<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

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\nThousands on thousands the tramp and the murmur poured; in their armoured<\/span><\/p>\n

\nGlittering tribes they were ranked, an untameable high-hearted nation<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWaiting the voice of its chiefs. Some gazed on the greatness of Priam<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAncient, remote from their days, the last of the gods who were passing,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLeft like a soul uncompanioned in worlds where his strength shall not
\nconquer:<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSole like a column gigantic alone on a desolate hill-side<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOlder than mortals he seemed and mightier. Many in anger<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAimed their hostile looks where calm though by heaven abandoned,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLeft to his soul and his lucid mind and its thoughts unavailing,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLeading the age-chilled few whom the might of their hearts had not blinded,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFamous Antenor was seated, the fallen unpopular statesman,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWisest of speakers in Troy but rejected, stoned and dishonoured.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSilent, aloof from the people he sat, a heart full of ruins.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLow was the rumour that swelled like the hum of the bees in a meadow<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWhen with the thirst of the honey they swarm on the thyme and the linden,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHundreds humming and flitting till all that place is a murmur.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThen from his seat like a tower arising Priam the monarch<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSlowly erect in his vast tranquillity silenced the people:<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLonely, august he stood like one whom death has forgotten,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tReared like a column of might and of silence over the assembly.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSo Olympus rises alone with his snows into heaven.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCrowned were his heights by the locks that swept like the mass of the
\nsnow-swathe<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tClothing his giant shoulders; his eyes of deep meditation,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nEyes that beheld now the end and accepted it like the beginning<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tGazed on the throng of the people as on a pomp that is painted:<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSlowly he spoke like one who is far from the scenes where he sojourns.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t“Leader of Ilion, hero Deiphobus, thou who hast summoned<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTroy in her people, arise; say wherefore thou callest us. Evil<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSpeak thou or good, thou canst speak that only: Necessity fashions<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAll that the unseen eye has beheld. Speak then to the Trojans;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSay on this dawn of her making what issue of death or of triumph<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFate in her suddenness puts to the unseeing, what summons to perish<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSend to this nation men who revolt and gods who are hostile.”<\/span><\/p>\n

\nRising Deiphobus spoke, in stature less than his father,<\/span><\/p>\n

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\nPage \u2013 358<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\nLess in his build, yet the mightiest man and tallest whom coursers<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBore or his feet to the fight since Ajax fell by the Xanthus.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n“People of Ilion, long have you fought with the gods and the Argives<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSlaying and slain, but the years persist and the struggle is endless.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFainting your helpers cease from the battle, the nations forsake you.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAsia weary of strenuous greatness, ease-enamoured<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSuffers the foot of the Greek to tread on the beaches of Troas.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tYet have we striven for Troy and for Asia, men who desert us.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nNot for ourselves alone have we fought, for our life of a moment!<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOnce if the Greeks were triumphant, once if their nations were marshalled<\/span><\/p>\n

\nUnder some far-seeing chief, Odysseus, Peleus, Achilles,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tNot on the banks of Scamander and skirts of the azure Aegean<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFainting would cease the audacious emprise, the Titanic endeavour;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTigris would flee from their tread and Indus be drunk by their coursers.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nNow in these days when each sun goes marvelling down that Troy stands yet<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSuffering, smiting, alive, though doomed to all eyes that behold her,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFlinging back Death from her walls and bronze to the shock and the clamour,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tDriven by a thought that has risen in the dawn from the tents on the beaches<\/span><\/p>\n

\nGrey Talthybius’ chariot waits in the Ilian portals,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tVoice of the Hellene demigod challenges timeless Troya.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThus has he said to us: Know you not Doom when she walks in your heavens?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFeelst thou not then thy set, O sun who illuminedst Nature?<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tStripped of helpers you stand alone against Doom and Achilles,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLeft by the earth that served you, by heaven that helped you rejected:<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tDeath insists at your gates and the flame and the sword are impatient.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nNone can escape the wheel of the gods and its vast revolutions!<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tFate demands the joy and pride of the earth for the Argive,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAsia’s wealth for the lust of the young barbarian nations.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCity divine, whose fame overroofed like heaven the nations,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSink eclipsed in the circle vast of my radiance; Troya,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tJoined to my northern realms deliver the East to the Hellene;<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIlion, to Hellas be yoked; wide Asia, fringe thou Peneus.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLay down golden Helen, a sacrifice lovely and priceless<\/span><\/p>\n

\nCast by your weakness and fall on immense Necessity’s altar;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tYield to my longing Polyxena, Hecuba’s deep-bosomed daughter,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHer whom my heart desires. She shall leave with you peace and her healing<\/span><\/p>\n

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\n

\nJoy of mornings secure and death repulsed from your hearthsides.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tYield these and live, else I leap on you, Fate in front, Hades behind me.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBound to the gods by an oath I return not again from the battle<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTill from high Ida my shadow extends to the Mede and Euphrates.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLet not your victories deceive you, steps that defeat has imagined;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHear not the voice of your heroes; their fame is a trumpet in Hades:<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOnly they conquer while yet my horses champ free in their stables.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tEarth cannot long resist the man whom Heaven has chosen;<\/span><\/p>\n

\nGods with him walk; his chariot is led; his arm is assisted.’<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHigh rings the Hellene challenge, earth waits for the Ilian answer.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAlways man’s Fate hangs poised on the flitting breath of a moment;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCalled by some word, by some gesture it leaps, then ’tis graven, ’tis granite.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSpeak! by what gesture high shall the stern gods recognise Troya?<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSons of the ancients, race of the gods, inviolate city,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFirmer my spear shall I grasp or cast from my hand and for ever?<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSearch in your hearts if your fathers still dwell in them, children of Teucer.”<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSo Deiphobus spoke and the nation heard him in silence,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAwed by the shadow vast of doom, indignant with Fortune.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nCalm from his seat Antenor arose as a wrestler arises,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTamer of beasts in the cage of the lions, eyeing the monsters<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBrilliant, tawny of mane, and he knows if his courage waver,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tFalter his eye or his nerve be surprised by the gods that are hostile,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nDeath will leap on him there in the crowded helpless arena.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tFearless Antenor arose, and a murmur swelled in the meeting<\/span><\/p>\n

\nCruel and threatening, hoarse like the voice of the sea upon boulders;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHisses thrilled through the roar and one man cried to another,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n“Lo he will speak of peace who has swallowed the gold of Achaia!<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSurely the people of Troy are eunuchs who suffer Antenor<\/span><\/p>\n

\nRising unharmed in the agora. Are there not stones in the city?<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSurely the steel grows dear in the land when a traitor can flourish.”<\/span><\/p>\n

\nCalm like a god or a summit Antenor stood in the uproar.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBut as he gazed on his soul came memory dimming the vision;<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFor he beheld his past and the agora crowded and cheering,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPassionate, full of delight while Antenor spoke to the people,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTroy that he loved and his fatherland proud of her eloquent statesman.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTears to his eyes came thick and he gripped at the staff he was holding.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMounting his eyes met fully the tumult, mournful and thrilling,<\/span><\/p>\n

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\nConquering men’s hearts with a note of doom in its sorrowful sweetness.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t“People of Ilion, blood of my blood, O race of Antenor,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOnce will I speak though you slay me; for who would shrink from destruction<\/span><\/p>\n

\nKnowing that soon of his city and nation, his house and his dear ones<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAll that remains will be a couch of trampled ashes? Athene,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSlain today may I join the victorious souls of our fathers,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tNot for the anguish be kept and the irremediable weeping.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLoud will I speak the word that the gods have breathed in my spirit,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tStrive this last time to save the death-destined. Who are these clamour<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHear him not, gold of the Greeks bought his words and his throat is
\naccursed’?<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTroy whom my counsels made great, hast thou heard this roar of their frenzy<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTearing thy ancient bosom? Is it thy voice, heaven-abandoned, my mother?<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tO my country, O my creatress, earth of my longings!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nEarth where our fathers lie in their sacred ashes undying,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMemoried temples shelter the shrines of our gods and the altars<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPure where we worshipped, the beautiful children smile on us passing,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWomen divine and the men of our nation! O land where our childhood<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPlayed at a mother’s feet mid the trees and the hills of our country,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHoping our manhood toiled and our youth had its seekings for
\n\t\t\tgodhead,  \u2014 <\/span> <\/p>\n

\nThou for our age keepst repose mid the love and the honour of kinsmen,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSilent our relics shall lie with the city guarding our ashes!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nEarth who hast fostered our parents, earth who hast given us our offspring,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSoil that created our race where fed from the bosom of Nature<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHappy our children shall dwell in the storied homes of their fathers,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSouls that our souls have stamped, sweet forms of ourselves when we perish!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOnce even then have they seen thee in their hearts, or dreamed of thee ever<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWho from thy spirit revolt and only thy name make an idol<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHating thy faithful sons and the cult of thy ancient ideal!<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWake, O my mother divine, remember thy gods and thy wisdom,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSilence the tongues that degrade thee, prophets profane of thy godhead.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMadmen, to think that a man who has offered his life for his country,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nServed her with words and deeds and adored with victories and triumphs<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tEver could think of enslaving her breast to the heel of a foeman!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSurely Antenor’s halls are empty, he begs from the stranger<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLeading his sons and his children’s sons by the hand in the market<\/span><\/p>\n

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\nShowing his rags since his need is so bitter of gold from the Argives!<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tYou who demand a reply when Laocoon lessens Antenor,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHush then your feeble roar and your ear to the past and the distance<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTurn. You fields that are famous for ever, reply for me calling,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFields of the mighty mown by my sword’s edge, Chersonese conquered,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThrace and her snows where we fought on the frozen streams and were
\nvictors<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThen when they were unborn who are now your delight and your leaders.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnswer return, you columns of Ilus, here where my counsels<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMade Troy mightier guiding her safe through the shocks of her foemen.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nGold! I have heaped it up high, I am rich with the spoils of your haters.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIt was your fathers dead who gave me that wealth as my guerdon,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nNow my reproach, your fathers who saw not the Greeks round their ramparts:<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThey were not cooped by an upstart race in the walls of Apollo,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSaw not Hector slain and Troilus dragged by his coursers.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFar over wrathful Jaxartes they rode; the shaken Achaian<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tProstrate adored your strength who now shouts at your portals and conquers<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThen when Antenor guided Troy, this old man, this traitor,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tNot Laocoon, nay, not even Paris nor Hector.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBut I have changed, I have grown a niggard of blood and of treasure,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSelfish, chilled as old men seem to the young and the headstrong,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nCounselling safety and ease, not the ardour of noble decisions.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCome to my house and behold, my house that was filled once with voices.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSons whom the high gods envied me crowded the halls that are silent.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWhere are they now? They are dead, their voices are silent in Hades,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFallen slaying the foe in a war between sin and the Furies.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSilent they went to the battle to die unmourned for their country,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nDie as they knew in vain. Do I keep now the last ones remaining,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSparing their blood that my house may endure? Is there any in Troya<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSpeeds to the front of the mellay outstripping the sons of Antenor?<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLet him arise and speak and proclaim it and bid me be silent.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHeavy is this war that you love on my heart and I hold you as madmen<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tDoomed by the gods, abandoned by Pallas, by Hera afflicted.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWho would not hate to behold his work undone by the foolish?<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWho would not weep if he saw Laocoon ruining Troya,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nParis doomed in his beauty, Aeneas slain by his valour?<\/span><\/p>\n

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\nStill you need to be taught that the high gods see and remember,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tDream that they care not if justice be done on the earth or oppression!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHappy to live, aspire while you violate man and the immortals!<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tVainly the sands of Time have been strewn with the ruins of empires,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSigns that the gods had left, but in vain. For they look for a nation,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOne that can conquer itself having conquered the world, but they find none.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nNone has been able to hold all the gods in his bosom unstaggered,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAll have grown drunken with force and have gone down to Hell and to Ate.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAll have been thrust from their heights,’ say the fools; we shall live and for ever.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWe are the people at last, the children, the favourites; all things<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOnly to us are permitted.’ They too descend to the silence,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nDeath receives their hopes and the void their stirrings of action.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t“Eviller fate there is none than life too long among mortals.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nI have conversed with the great who have gone, I have fought in their war-cars;<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTros I have seen, Laomedon’s hand has dwelt on my temples.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tNow I behold Laocoon, now our greatest is Paris.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFirst when Phryx by the Hellespont reared to the cry of the ocean<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHewing her stones as vast as his thoughts his high-seated fortress,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPlanned he a lair for a beast of prey, for a pantheress dire-souled<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCrouched in the hills for her bound or self-gathered against the avenger?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nDardanus shepherded Asia’s coasts and her sapphire-girt islands.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMild was his rule like the blessing of rain upon fields in the summer.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nGladly the harried coasts reposed confessing the Phrygian,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCaria, Lycia’s kings and the Paphlagon, strength of the Mysian;<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMinos’ Crete recovered the sceptre of old Rhadamanthus.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIlus and Tros had strength in the fight like a far-striding Titan’s:<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTroy triumphant following the urge of their souls to the vastness,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHelmeted, crowned like a queen of the gods with the fates for her coursers<\/span><\/p>\n

\nRode through the driving sleet of the spears to Indus and Oxus.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThen twice over she conquered the vanquished, with peace as in battle;<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThere where discord had clashed, sweet Peace sat girded with plenty,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThere where tyranny counted her blows, came the hands of a father.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nNeither had Teucer a soul like your chiefs’ who refounded this nation.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSuch was the antique and noble tradition of Troy in her founders,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBuilders of power that endured; but it perishes lost to their offspring,<\/span><\/p>\n

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\nTrampled, scorned by an arrogant age, by a violent nation.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tStrong Anchises trod it down trampling victorious onwards<\/span><\/p>\n

\nStern as his sword and hard as the silent bronze of his armour.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMore than another I praise the man who is mighty and steadfast,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nEven as Ida the mountain I praise, a refuge for lions;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBut in the council I laud him not, he who a god for his kindred,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLives for the rest without bowels of pity or fellowship, lone-souled,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tScorning the world that he rules, who untamed by the weight of an empire<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHolds allies as subjects, subjects as slaves and drives to the battle<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCareless more of their wills than the courser’s yoked to his war-car.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTherefore they fought while they feared, but gladly abandon us falling.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tYet had they gathered to Teucer in the evil days of our nation.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWhere are they now? Do they gather then to the dreaded Anchises?<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOr has Aeneas helped with his counsels hateful to wisdom?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHateful is this, abhorred of the gods, imagined by Ate<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWhen against subjects murmuring discord and faction appointed<\/span><\/p>\n

\nScatter unblest gold, the heart of a people is poisoned,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tVirtue pursued and baseness triumphs tongued like a harlot,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBrother against brother arrayed that the rule may endure of a stranger.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tYes, but it lasts! For its hour. The high gods watch in their silence,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMute they endure for a while that the doom may be swifter and greater.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHast thou then lasted, O Troy? Lo, the Greeks at thy gates and Achilles.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nDream, when Virtue departs, that Wisdom will linger, her sister!<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWisdom has turned from your hearts; shall Fortune dwell with the foolish?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFatal oracles came to you great-tongued, vaunting of empires<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tStretched from the risen sun to his rest in the occident waters,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nDreams of a city throned on the hills with her foot on the nations.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMeanwhile the sword was prepared for our breasts and the flame for our
\nhousetops.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWake, awake, O my people! the fire-brand mounts up your doorsteps;<\/span><\/p>\n

\nGods who deceived to slay, press swords on your children’s bosoms.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSee, O ye blind, ere death in pale countries open your eyelids!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHear, O ye deaf, the sounds in your ears and the voices of evening!<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tYoung men who vaunt in your strength! when the voice of this aged Antenor<\/span><\/p>\n

\nGoverned your fathers’ youth, all the Orient was joined to our banners.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMacedon leaned to the East and her princes yearned to the victor,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nScythians worshipped in Ilion’s shrines, the Phoenician trader<\/span><\/p>\n

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\nBartered her tokens, Babylon’s wise men paused at our thresholds;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tFair-haired sons of the snows came rapt towards golden Troya<\/span><\/p>\n

\nDrawn by the song and the glory. Strymon sang hymns unto Ida,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHoarse Chalcidice, dim Chersonesus married their waters<\/span><\/p>\n

\nUnder the o’erarching yoke of Troy twixt the term-posts of Ocean.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMeanwhile far through the world your fortunes led by my counsels<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFollowed their lure like women snared by a magical tempter:<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHigh was their chant as they paced and it came from continents distant.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTurn now and hear! what voice approaches? what glitter of armies?<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLoud upon Trojan beaches the tread and the murmur of Hellas!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHark! ’tis the Achaian’s paean rings o’er the Pergaman waters!<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSo wake the dreams of Aeneas; reaped is Laocoon’s harvest.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nArtisans new of your destiny fashioned this far-spreading downfall,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCounsellors blind who scattered your strength to the hooves of the Scythian,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBarren victories, trophies of skin-clad Illyrian pastors.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWho but the fool and improvident, who but the dreamer and madman<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLeaves for the far and ungrasped earth’s close and provident labour?<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tChildren of earth, our mother gives tokens, she lays down her signposts,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nStep by step to advance on her bosom, to grow by her seasons,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOrder our works by her patience and limit our thought by her spaces.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBut you had chiefs who were demigods, souls of an earth-scorning stature,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMinds that saw vaster than life and strengths that God’s hour could not limit!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThese men seized upon Troy as the tool of their giant visions,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tDreaming of Africa’s suns and bright Hesperian orchards,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nCarthage our mart and our feet on the sunset hills of the Latins.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIlion’s hinds in the dream ploughed Libya, sowed Italy’s cornfields,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTroy stretched to Gades; even the gods and the Fates had grown Trojan.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSo are the natures of men uplifted by Heaven in its satire.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nScorning the bit of the gods, despisers of justice and measure,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tZeus is denied and adored some shadow huge of their natures<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLosing the shape of man in a dream that is splendid and monstrous.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTitans, vaunting they stride and the world resounds with their footsteps;<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTitans, clanging they fall and the world is full of their ruin.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tChildren, you dreamed with them, heard the roar of the Atlantic breakers<\/span><\/p>\n

\nWelcome your keels and the Isles of the Blest grew your wonderful gardens.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLulled in the dream, you saw not the black-drifting march of the storm-rack,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHeard not the galloping wolves of the doom and the howl of their hunger.<\/span><\/p>\n

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\nGreece in her peril united her jarring clans; you suffered<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPatient, preparing the north, the wisdom and silence of Peleus,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAtreus’ craft and the Argives gathered to King Agamemnon.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBut there were prophecies, Pythian oracles, mutterings from Delphi.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHow shall they prosper who haste after auguries, oracles, whispers,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tDreams that walk in the night and voices obscure of the silence?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTouches are these from the gods that bewilder the brain to its ruin.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOne sole oracle helps, still armoured in courage and prudence<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPatient and heedful to toil at the work that is near in the daylight.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLeave to the night its phantoms, leave to the future its curtain!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nOnly today Heaven gave to mortal man for his labour.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIf thou hadst bowed not thy mane, O Troy, to the child and the dreamer,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHadst thou been faithful to Wisdom the counsellor seated and ancient,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThen would the hour not have dawned when Paris lingered in Sparta<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLed by the goddess fatal and beautiful, white Aphrodite.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMan, shun the impulses dire that spring armed from thy nature’s abysms!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nDread the dusk rose of the gods, flee the honey that tempts from its petals!<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTherefore the black deed was done and the hearth that welcomed was sullied.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSin-called the Fury uplifted her tresses of gloom o’er the nations<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMaddening the earth with the scream of her blood-thirst, bowelless,
\nstone-eyed,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tClaiming her victims from God and bestriding the hate and the clamour.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nYet midst the stroke and the wail when men’s eyes were blind with the blood-mist,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nStill had the high gods mercy recalling Teucer and Ilus.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tJust was the heart of their anger. Discord flaming from Ida,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHundred-voiced glared from the ships through the camp of the victor
\n\t\t\tAchaians,  \u2014 <\/span> <\/p>\n

\nLove to that discord added her flowerlike lips of Briseis;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tFaltering lids of Polyxena conquered the strength of Pelides.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nVainly the gods who pity open the gates of salvation!<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tVainly the winds of their mercy breathe on our fevered existence!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMan his passions prefers to the voice that guides from the heavens.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThese too were here whom Hera had chosen to ruin this nation:<\/span><\/p>\n

\nCharioteers cracking the whips of their speed on the paths of destruction,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tDemigods they! they have come down from Heaven glad to that labour,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nDeaf is the world with the fame of their wheels as they race down to Hades.<\/span><\/p>\n

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\nO that alone they could reach it! O that pity could soften<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHarsh Necessity’s dealings, sparing our innocent children,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSaving the Trojan women and aged from bonds and the sword-edge!<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThese had not sinned whom you slay in your madness! Ruthless, O mortals,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMust you be then to yourselves when the gods even faltering with pity<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTurn from the grief that must come and the agony vast and the weeping?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSay not the road of escape sinks too low for your arrogant treading.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPride is not for our clay; the earth, not heaven was our mother<\/span><\/p>\n

\nAnd we are even as the ant in our toil and the beast in our dying;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOnly who cling to the hands of the gods can rise up from the earth-mire.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nChildren, lie prone to their scourge, that your hearts may revive in their sunshine.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThis is our lot! when the anger of heaven has passed then the mortal<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tRaises his head; soon he heals his heart and forgets he has suffered.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nYet if resurgence from weakness and shame were withheld from the creature,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tEvery fall without morrow, who then would counsel submission?<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBut since the height of mortal fortune ascending must stumble,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tFallen, again ascend, since death like birth is our portion,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nRipening, mowed, to be sown again like corn by the farmer,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLet us be patient still with the gods accepting their purpose.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nDeem not defeat I welcome. Think not to Hellas submitting<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tDeath of proud hope I would seal. Not this have I counselled, O nation,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBut to be even as your high-crested forefathers, greatest of mortals.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTroya of old enringed by the hooves of Cimmerian armies<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFlamed to the heavens from her plains and her smoke-blackened citadel sheltered<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMutely the joyless rest of her sons and the wreck of her greatness.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCourage and wisdom survived in that fall and a stern-eyed prudence<\/span><\/p>\n

\nHelped her to live; disguised from her mightiness Troy crouched waiting.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTeucer descended whose genius worked at this kingdom and nation,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPatient, scrupulous, wise, like a craftsman carefully toiling<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tOver a helmet or over a breastplate, testing it always,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nToiled in the eye of the Masters of all and had heed of its labour.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSo in the end they would not release him like souls that are common;<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThey out of Ida sent into Ilion Pallas Athene;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSecret she came and he went with her into the luminous silence.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTeucer’s children after their sire completed his labour.<\/span><\/p>\n

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\nNow too, O people, front adversity self-gathered, silent.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tVeil thyself, leonine mighty Ilion, hiding thy greatness!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nBe as thy father Teucer; be as a cavern for lions;<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBe as a Fate that crouches! Wordless and stern for your vengeance<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSelf-gathered work in the night and secrecy shrouding your bosoms.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLet not the dire heavens know of it; let not the foe seize a whisper!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nRipen the hour of your stroke, while your words drip sweeter than honey.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSure am I, friends, you will turn from death at my voice, you will hear me!<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSome day yet I shall gaze on the ruins of haughty Mycenae.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIs this not better than Ilion cast to the sword of her haters,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nIs this not happier than Troya captured and wretchedly burning,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTime to await in his stride when the southern and northern Achaians<\/span><\/p>\n

\nGazing with dull distaste now over their severing isthmus<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHate-filled shall move to the shock by the spur of the gods in them driven,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPelops march upon Attica, Thebes descend on the Spartan?<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThen shall the hour now kept in heaven for us ripen to dawning,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThen shall Victory cry to our banners over the Ocean<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCalling our sons with her voice immortal. Children of Ilus,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nThen shall Troy rise in her strength and stride over Greece up to Gades.”<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSo Antenor spoke and the mind of the hostile assembly<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMoved and swayed with his words like the waters ruled by Poseidon.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tEven as the billows rebellious lashed by the whips of the tempest<\/span><\/p>\n

\nCurvet and rear their crests like the hooded wrath of a serpent,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tGreen-eyed under their cowls sublime, 
\n\t\t\t\u2014  unwilling they journey,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nFoam-bannered, hoarse-voiced, shepherded, forced by the wind to the margin<\/span><\/p>\n

\nMeant for their rest and can turn not at all, though they rage, on their
\n\t\t\tdriver,  \u2014 <\/span> <\/p>\n

\nLast with a sullen applause and consenting lapse into thunder,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWhere they were led all the while they sink down huge and astonished,<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSo in their souls that withstood and obeyed and hated the yielding,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tLashed by his censure, indignant, the Trojans moved towards his purpose:<\/span><\/p>\n

\nSometimes a roar arose, then only, weakened, rarer,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAngry murmurs swelled between sullen stretches of silence;<\/span><\/p>\n

\nLast, a reluctant applause broke dull from the throats of the commons.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSilent raged in their hearts Laocoon’s following daunted;<\/span><\/p>\n

\nTroubled the faction of Paris turned to the face of their leader.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 368<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\nHe as yet rose not; careless he sat in his beauty and smiling,<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tGazing with brilliant eyes at the sculptured pillars of Ilus.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nDoubtful, swayed by Antenor, waited in silence the nation.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 369<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\t\t\t<\/font>\n\t\t\t<\/td>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  BOOK II   The Book of the Statesman   Now from his cycle sleepless and vast round the dance of the earth-globe Gold Hyperion…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2985","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-02-collected-poems","wpcat-57-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2985","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2985"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2985\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2985"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2985"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2985"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}