Jason and Medeia Read online

  temple

  to be called the Temple of Concord as long as the world

  may last.’

  We did so—poured libations out and, touching the

  sacrifice,

  swore by the solemnest oaths that we’d stand by one

  another

  forever. A moving ceremony. I did not say as much as I thought to Orpheus after he’d ended it.

  “We travelled on, young Orpheus stroking his lyre as

  though

  it counted for more than the sails. And did he expect to

  stir up

  rancor in me by his proof that art may also serve morale? Then that was a difference between us. I use

  what means

  I can to achieve my ends; I no more resented his help than the wind’s. If the quality of acts concerns him, the

  smell and taste,

  the moment to moment morality of it, let him take care of those. What he’d done to show me up, make a fool

  of me,

  was just what I’d sought myself. So who was the fool?

  But I

  was Captain, and not required to give explanations.

  “And so

  we came to the river Lykos and the Anthemoeisian lagoon. The Argo’s halyards and all her tackle quivered as we flashed along; but during the night the wind died

  down,

  and at dawn we moored at the Cape of Akherusias, a towering headland with sheer rock cliffs that blindly

  stare out

  across the Bithynian Sea. Beneath the headland, at sea

  level,

  a solid platform of smooth-swept rock where rollers

  endlessly

  break and roar; at the crown of the headland, plane

  trees rising

  stretching their great, dark beams to blot out the sun.

  We went in.

  I watched our pilot. He was restless, too silent.

  I remembered the words

  of Orpheus. I took Idmon aside, younger of the seers, and spoke to him. Said: ‘Idmon, look over at Tiphys,

  there.

  Tell me what you see.’ He turned his head away quickly,

  refused

  to hear. Then he said, ‘If you’ve come for hopeful news,

  you’ve come

  to the wrong man. There is no hopeful news—not on

  that

  or anything.’ He tipped his face. He was weeping.

  I frowned,

  baffled again, and left him. How could I have guessed

  what grief

  the poor man had on his mind? We had work, in any

  case—

  the usual repairs, the usual gathering of wood and

  leaves. …

  “On the landward side, the vaulting sea-naes sloped

  away

  to a hollow glen, a cave with overhanging trees and

  rocks,

  the Cavern of Hades. From its pitchdark hollows an icy

  breath

  comes up each morning, covering rocks, trees, ferns

  with sparkling

  rime that clings three hours, then melts in the sun.

  We listened.

  A rumble like voices, the far-off murmur of rollers

  breaking

  at the foot of the cliff, the whisper of leaves as the wind

  from the cave

  pressed by, and perhaps some further voice, like a

  voice in a dream,

  a memory. We stood at the mouth of the cave looking

  down

  at darkness, musing. Shoulder to shoulder we stood,

  peering in,

  Ankaios, the boy in the bearskin; old Mopsos; wise old

  Argus,

  artificer; huge Telamon; Orpheus; Tiphys (his breathing was short and quick); myself, all the others… . We

  stood peering in,

  shoulder to shoulder, each one of us, that instant, alone, thinking of his personal dead, his private death. But

  Idas

  widened his eyes, leered wildly, whispering, ‘Ghosts!’

  He clung

  to my arm, clowning even here. I shook him free.

  My cousin

  Akastos touched my shoulder to calm my wrath.

  “Not long

  thereafter, one of our number would go down through

  that door

  alive, in search of his love, as Theseus had gone already for a friend, when both of them were young. It’s said

  that Orpheus

  willingly moved past Briareos, with his hundred

  whirling arms,

  moved past the terrible nine-headed Hydra and the great

  flame-breathing

  dragon, encountered the colossal giant Tityus, whose great, black, bloated body sprawled across nine

  full acres,

  and came to the midnight palace of Lord Dionysos

  himself,

  prince of terror, bull-god, huntsman whom nothing

  escapes.

  Majestically then, without words, a mere nod, old

  Kadmos the Dark

  granted what he asked, but after the nod set this

  condition:

  The harper must lead the way, and Euridike follow—

  a woodnymph,

  gentlest, most timid of all creatures, a heart more

  quickly alarmed

  than a deer’s (not two men living have ever seen her

  kind:

  they vanish in a splinter of light at the sound of a

  footfall). She must follow,

  and the harper never look back. (How like the gods,

  I thought,

  when I learned of it, to end his pains with a joke.)

  But he agreed.

  No choice, of course. Began his slow way back through

  the dimness,

  stepping past pits where blue-scaled snakes rolled

  coil on coil,

  their hatchet heads hovering, floating, the whole dark

  trogle alive

  with rattling and hissing and the seething of the

  sulphurous pits. He listened,

  harping the guardian serpents to sleep—the horned

  cerastes,

  the basilisk with its lethal eyes—and he heard her step, timid, behind him, and so, chest pounding, continued.

  Moved past

  terrors to make a man sick—much less a nymph,

  coming after him,

  alone. And still he gazed forward. Imagine it! Shrieks,

  screams, cackles,

  flashes of light, sudden forms, quick wings, sharp hisses

  of air,

  bright skulls (Was that my Euridike’s scream?) …

  How the gods must have howled,

  rolled in the dirt on their bellies. —However, he’d agreed, one capable of death, therefore of dignity, and so, solemn in the Funhouse (behind him the

  beautiful woodnymph,

  white arms reaching, yellow hair streaming in the

  cavern’s wind,

  eyes like a fawn’s), he moves past grisly shapes,

  indecent

  allegories—Grief, Avenging Care, and (look!) there’s Pale Disease, the back of his hand to his forehead

  (woe!),

  and lo, there’s Melancholy Age, his hand on his pecker,

  shrunk

  to a stick. Step wider, Orpheus! That’s Hunger there! Snaps like a dog! And by him, Fear, trembling, pressed

  close

  to Pain and Poverty and Death! So past them all they

  moved,

  those lovers, and he saw the first faint light of day.

  They’d made it!

  No more horrors, not even a spider, a hornèd ant between where he stood and the green-edged light of

  freedom! He turned.

  She ran toward him … and vanished. He stared in grief

  and rage

  and then, with a groan, remembered. And so he left the

 
; Funhouse,

  walked out into the light. He died soon after, a wreck. Go there now and you’ll see two shades together, alone on a flat rock ledge, holding hands. There are sounds

  of dripping springs,

  faint moans farther in, the whisper of spiders walking.

  “A tale

  most spiritual, most moving. And yet I’ll tell you the

  truth:

  He wouldn’t have done it at forty, or even at thirty.

  He’d have wept

  and ordered a monument for her, or started a fund.

  Shall we say

  hooray for youth, inexperience? Shall we grieve our

  loss,

  splendor in the grass, mourn that we’ve passed

  twenty-three? I’ve seen

  small boys tease snakes, dive into torrents, eat poison, planning to survive. The innocent are fools, and the wise are cowards. Between those

  two grim lots

  we construct, out of paper and false red hair, our

  dignity.

  “Never mind. We stood by the cave, looking in. Old

  Mopsos said:

  ‘Shade you’d care to converse with, lord of the

  Argonauts?’

  He was smiling, food in his beard. I shook my head.

  He turned

  to Tiphys, and his smile was wicked now. ‘Maybe you

  then, Tiphys!

  Something tells me you’re eager to see inside.’ But

  Idmon,

  younger of the seers, broke in. ‘Old witch, enough of

  this!’

  His voice cracked. He was enraged. Bright tears

  splashed down his cheeks.

  His fists were clenched, and if Telamon hadn’t reached

  out and restrained him—

  he and the boy, Ankaios—we might have lost Mopsos

  right then.

  I spoke up quickly: ‘We’ve wood to gather.’ We turned

  away.

  And so, at that Cape, we passed six days. Unprofitably.

  “We left two graves on the island. We saw the first

  night that Tiphys

  was not himself—irritable, testy, unable to keep warm though sweat stood out on his forehead. From old King

  Lykos’ city,

  nearby, we called physicians. They came—great fat old

  mules.

  With their fingertips they opened the sick man’s eyes,

  peeked in

  and solemnly shook their heads. ‘Here’s a dying man,’

  they said.

  We watched with him, praying to Apollo, god of healing.

  But Idmon,

  younger of the seers, refused to come close. He knew

  that his time

  had come, and he meant to stay far from the thing, give

  fate the slip.

  He would not walk in the woods with us, nor go where

  there might be

  vipers, spiders, bees. He went out to a wide, low field and set up an altar to Apollo and, wailing, threw

  himself over it,

  moaning, pleading for mercy; his face and chest were

  bathed

  in tears. Not all his prophetic lore, not all his prayers could save him. By a reedy stream at the edge of the

  water-meadow

  there lay a white-tusked boar—he was big as an ox—

  cooling

  his huge belly and his bristly flanks in the mud. He lived alone, too old for sows; an isolate. There young Idmon went, cutting reeds for his altar fire. The boar rose up with a jerk, a grunt of annoyance; with one quick,

  casual tusk,

  opened the young seer’s thigh. He fell to the ground,

  shrieking.

  Those who were nearest him rushed to his aid. Too late,

  of course.

  The boar had opened his belly now, from the bowels to

  the chest.

  Peleus let fly his javelin as the boar retreated; he turned, charged again. And now crazy Idas wounded

  him,

  and unsatisfied when the boar went down on his knees,

  impaled,

  Idas threw himself over him, screaming like a boar

  himself,

  seized the boar by the knife-sharp tusks and twisted till

  he broke

  its neck. Moaning, they carried Idmon to the ship, and

  there,

  in Idas’ arms, he died. Idas raged, beat the planks with

  his fists.

  He didn’t remember then that he’d wanted to kill poor

  Idmon

  once. We dug the grave. Where Tiphys lay, the

  physicians

  talked. One spoke of a curious case. He sat in the

  corner,

  fingers interlaced on his belt, his eyes half shut. He said, droning, blinking his red-webbed eyes, familiar with

  death:

  ‘… a case of decay of the extremities. On the hands the tipjoints and in part even the second joints of the fingers were wanting, having rotted off, and the remaining stumps of the fingers were much swollen and in part nearly ready to fall off. The right-hand knuckle joint of the youngest child’s forefinger was already rotting away, and the feet of the two older brothers were in still a more horrible state. They were mere shapeless masses surcharged with foreign matter, with several deep, consuming sores going down to the bone and discharging bloody, putrid water. The children’s arms and legs had lost all sense of feeling below the elbows and knees. Some fellow before me, in order to ascertain the insensibility of the members, had pierced one boy through the hand up the arm with a long needle to a point where pain was felt, which occurred at the elbow. The patients’ exhalations were positively unbearable, the true odor of putrescence. The digestion was utterly prostrated.’

  The other was more metaphysical. He smoothed his

  beard,

  pacing, occasionally rolling an eye toward Tiphys. His

  heavy

  robe trailed on the planking, occasionally snagged. He

  said:

  ‘… deal of nonsense been spoken about death, if you want my professional opinion. For instance, “Dying is the only thing no one can do for me.” Grotesque banality! If to die is to die in order to achieve some end—to inspire, to bear witness, for the country, or some such, then anyone at all can die in my place—as In the song in which lots are drawn to see who’s to be eaten. There is no personalizing virtue, so to speak, which is peculiar to my death. Or again, they say, “Death is the resolved chord which ends the melody.” Sentimental tripe! Hogwash! An end of a melody, in order to confer its meaning on the melody, must emanate from the melody itself, as any fool should be able to recognize. The perpetual appearance of the element of Chance at the heart of each of a given man’s projects cannot be apprehended as that man’s possibility but, on the contrary, as the nihilation of all his possibilities, a nihilation which itself is no longer a part of his possibilities. Death is the end, the putrification, of freedom.’

  So they spoke, waiting out the night, doing all they

  could for us.

  However, for all their wisdom, Tiphys died. We dug a grave, a pit by Idmon’s, one more gap in the flow of Space. I had strange dreams that night. I dreamed

  I stood

  in a silent, twilit land where all was ruled, where there

  were

  pyramids and pillars and porches, colonnades and

  domes;

  and I entered the gates and approached. At the center

  of the city I found

  a great square, with obelisks that quadrasected the square; between the central two stood a stone crypt, the grave, I thought, of a person of some importance.

  But as

  I stepped more near, I knew it was no mere mortal’s

  grave.

  The door swung open. In the darkness within I saw the

  corpse—

  monstrous, luminous—of a snake. I forget the rest. />
  Orpheus

  whispered something, old Argus crooked his finger at

  me.

  I screamed, I remember, and woke with my head in

  my cousin Akastos’

  scrawny arms. I drew away in anger. No reason.

  “We slaughtered sheep, our due to the dead; and

  Argus built

  a barrow over their graves. And after all this was done, and no one among us could think of a further rite,

  we found

  our heaviness more than before. All the Argonauts cast

  themselves down

  by the sea and lay like figures hacked out of stone.

  I lacked

  the heart to move them, and Orpheus gave me no help,

  prepared

  to let all the crowd of them rot for his artist’s

  self-righteousness,

  his pleasure in seeing the cool politician helpless.

  They refused

  to eat—no spirit left. So they lay for days, staring, and I, their captain, with them, awash in Time and

  the doctors’

  words: the element of chance. Decay of the extremities.

  12

  “Ankaios, child in a bearskin, leaned on the steering oar, all smiles, hell-driving his cargo of half-dead Argonauts. They knew no more than I. It seemed some god

  possessed him,

  pricked him to whimsy. He’d thrown us aboard, pushed

  the Argo out,

  climbed on, drawn down the sail to the wind. He came

  from a line

  of sailing people. Watched his father, his grandfather,learned their tricks. If the boy lacked judgment—

  teasing the rocks,

  tempting the wind, the waves—we were none the

  worse for it.

  He believed himself indestructible, great Zeus his friend, as if they’d made some pact between them—and maybe

  they had,

  that moment: a blast from the god’s nostrils, and the

  Argo’s sails

  were filled, and all our enslaving griefs devoured like

  stubble:

  We were moving again; caught in the mill of the

  universe—youth

  and age, wisdom and stupidity, sorrow and joy—the

  ancient

  balances, wheels of the age-old meaningless grinding.

  Time

  washed over us in waves. Say it was a dream. Behind our stern a fleet assembled, black ships taller than

  mountains,

  sailless, laboring north as if in their flagship’s wake. We turned to each other, questioning, baffled to discover

  that here

  we were, on the move again, coming more awake,