University of Virginia Library

ERÔS AND ANTERÔS.

Erôs in pity smiled across the tears
Unloved Ianthê shed upon a breast
Their limpid dew in laving did not stain;
And comforted the child with vow to wound
With his keen arrow the unriven heart
Of Glaukos, who had robbed her of the grace
Of careless maidenhood—the cloudless hours
By fount, by distaff, 'mid the busy troop
Of washers by the stream, or gayer throng
Of those who wrought the peplos for their own
Athênê, and bore joyous to her shrine:
The youth should feel how love doth inly hurt;
Ianthê's woes be lightened. By the god's
Own darts was message brought of her desire
And love-consuming languishment for him
Who ne'er had wooed her: he, implacable,
Took her love coldly as the gods take gifts
Of fore-rejected suppliants; and the girl,
Flushed with love-gendered hate and agony
Of infamous refusal, turned to him
Whom Erebos by Nux had gotten, blind,
Dull-winged, a bearer of the leaden dart,
And torch that spread the smouldering fire of hate
'Mid those who had despised the clean hearth-flame
Of Hestia, or on Aphrodîtê's son
Heaped the insufferable scorn. “Avenge
Me of my wrongs; bring from thine own dark land
All ills that thou canst summon: let him feel
From love is bitterer banishment than light.
Make his life upper Hadês: as the thirst
Of ghostly lips for the forbidden blood
That shall give pulse and passion, be his need
Of the bright joys that impious he hath scorned.
So will I give thee honour, Anterôs,
Scorning thy brother's impotence.” He heard
Who couched in Erebos, and summoned all
The ills of that dark kingdom to his aid:
But the proud heart, unconquerably cold,
Could not be moved; more stubborn to resist
Hatred's mad fury than essay of love.
Ianthê rested unavenged. One day
Flashed bright upon her the effulgent god
Whose perfect puissance she had dared to doubt
Since Glaukos still was pitiless. A kiss
His mother gave him from the pouted lips
Warmer to wake Adônis; and serene
In lustrous loveliness he passed to her
Who thought him vanquished. “I alone can harm,
Thou faithless, thou mistrusting maiden; see,
With smiling face I go to thy revenge;
It shall be mortal.” Glaukos spied the boy
And to his cold cheek rushed the glow: “Of me,
Stung by thy sole defeat, audacious Love,
Dost thou make double trial; I am proof.
Though thy keen dart hath scarred Zeus' ivory breast,
And drawn from Hêrê's bosom other pain
Than angered her when Heraklês too hard
Pressed for the milky sweets, and being loosed
Let fall the drops brimming his baby lips
On heaven's floor, a lovely lacteate stream!”
“Rubied with clearest ichor, Erôs' shaft
Will never dip in dye of Glaukos' blood.”
So boasted the vain-glorious boy, and urged
His heart to strong contention, emulous
To gain a second victory o'er one
Whose terrors shook Olumpos: but unmoved
Erôs passed by him in a bright disdain,
And of the god's indifference he died.