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Iliad V ll 998ff
(Fagles, p 192)
But now,
wild as a black cyclone twisting out of a cloudbank,
building up from the day's heat, blasts and towers-
so brazen Ares looked to Tydeus' son Diomedes.
Soaring up with the clouds to the broad sweeping sky
he quickly gained the gods' stronghold, steep Olympus,
and settling down by the side of Cronus' great son Zeus,
his spirit racked with pain, Ares displayed the blood,
the fresh immortal blood that gushed from his wound,
and burst out in a flight of self-pity: "Father Zeus,
aren't you incensed to see such violent brutal work?
We everlasting gods . . . Ah what chilling blows
we suffer-thanks to our own conflicting wills—
whenever we show these mortal men some kindness.
And we all must battle you—
you brought that senseless daughter into the world,
that murderous curse-forever bent on crimes!
While all the rest of us, every god on Olympus
bows down to you, each of us overpowered.
But that
girl—
you never block her way with a word or action, never,
you spur her on, since you, you gave her birth
from your own head, that child of devastation!
Just look at this reckless Diomedes now—
Athena spurred him on to rave against the gods.
First he lunges at Aphrodite, stabs her hand at the wrist
then charges me—even me—like something superhuman!
But I, I'm so fast on my feet I saved my life.
Else for a good long while I'd have felt the pain,
writhing among the corpses there, or soldiered on,
weak as a breathless ghost, beaten down by bronze."
But Zeus who
marshals storm clouds lowered a dark glance
and let loose at Ares: "No more, you lying, two-faced . . .
no more sidling up to me, whining here before me.
You—I hate you most of all the Olympian gods.
Always dear to your heart,
strife, yes, and battles, the bloody grind of war.
You have your mother's uncontrollable rage-incorrigible,
that Hera—say what I will, I can hardly keep her down.
Hera's urgings, I trust,' have made you suffer this.
But I cannot bear to see you agonize so long.
You are my child. To me your mother bore you.
If you had sprung from another god, believe me,
and grown into such a blinding devastation,
long ago you'd have dropped below the Titans,
deep in the dark pit."
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