History lesson beginning with a fragment from Aeschylus ; by nick lantz (from jubilat 30.5)
Nick kindly gave me permission to share it with you here, since it’s not available elsewhere. You can find all of his books here.
the eagle, struck
by an arrow,
looks down
& recognizes
its own feather
fletching the shaft
Agamemnon killed his daughter
for a fair wind. For a wall. For a better
deal. Because a priest told him to.
To make his country great again.
For this, Clytemnestra, his wife,
killed Agamemnon, & for that,
their son, Orestes, killed her back.
Remember, now, that Clytemnestra
was the daughter of Leda, raped
by a swan. her sister, Helen, we blame
for launching all those Greek ships
that needed the wind for which
Agamenon killed his daughter,
for which Clymenestra killed
her husband & oh yes (don't forget)
also Cassandra, the concubine
he took from Troy. Poor Cassandra,
who killed no one, but who was raped
in the temple of Athena, an act
for which Athena cursed the Greeks,
who she'd sent to Troy in the first place.
But even before that, it was Apollo
who forced himself on Cassandra
(another temple, another rape),
and when she refused, but never to be
believed, & so Cassandra knew it all
beforehand (the ships, Ajax's breath
on her neck on the temple floor
the knife in Clytemnestra's hand),
but when she warned the Trojans
what was waiting at their gates
they locked her in a prison.
Oh, & what happened to Orestes,
who killed his mother, who'd killed
his father, who'd killed
his sister?
He got off at trial, & the Furies
who wanted nothing but to tear
his flesh had to sit on their claws,
tamed now to the rule of law, to the will
of the people (the same people, who,
on Aeschylus's epitaph, recorded
his military deeds & never mentioned
his tragedies), & if it seems unclear
which side I'm asking you to choose -
the bloodless law or the bloody Furies -
it's only because I can't choose,
& anyway neither side ever cared
much about Cassandra or Leda
or Iphigenia (that was the name
of the daughter Agamemnon killed),
only the glory of the civilization
those great men made on their bloody
islands amid that wine-dark sea.
| 8 |
