“Which of these woes am I to choose? My mind
is reeling. There’s no respite from the pain.
It burns and burns. It burns. I wish the arrows
1020 (774)of Artemis had struck me dead before
I saw that man, yes, long before the sons of
Chalciope had ever left for Greece.
Some god, some Fury shipped pains overflowing
with grief from there to here, right here, to me.
1025Let Jason perish in the competition,
if he is doomed to perish. If I gave him
the drug, how could my parents fail to learn
what I had done? What reason could I give them?
What lie or ploy would be of any use?
1030If I see him alone, without his friends,
will I acknowledge him? My lot is cruel.
I cannot hope that, even when he dies,
I will be free from anguish. He will be
a curse on me when he has lost his life.
1035 (786)So good-bye, modesty. Good-bye, fair name.
Once I have saved him, let him go unharmed
wherever he desires while I, the day
that he completes the contest, leave this life
by dangling my body from a rafter
1040or taking drugs, the kind that kill the heart . . .
but, when I’m dead, they all will stand there eyeing
my ruin. The entire town will pass
around the story of my fall, and all
the Colchian girls will bear me on their lips
1045everywhere, harshly savaging my name:
She loved that foreigner so much it killed her.
By giving way to lust, she has disgraced
her house and home.
What shame will not be mine?
Ah, mad obsession! No, it would be better
1050 (799)to take my life here in my room tonight
and by an inexplicable demise
escape such dreadful infamy before
I do this shameful and outrageous deed.”
So she resolved and went to fetch the casket
1055in which her many drugs, some good, some baneful,
were kept. She set it on her knees and wept.
Her nightgown’s folds were wet so thoroughly
with tears that streams of grief were flowing from her.
Shrilly lamenting, keening her own death,
1060she wanted to reach out, select, and swallow
poison to end her life. She was already
unfastening the hasps in her desire
to take it out, poor girl. Soon, though, a deathly
antipathy to baneful Hades vanquished
1065 (811)the urge. She was a long time held there, speechless.
The heart-delighting joys of daylight sparkled
before her eyes, and she recalled the countless
pleasures the living relish and recalled
her darling playmates, as a maiden would.
1070So long as she kept going over all
these pleasures one by one inside her mind,
the light of life was sweeter to behold
than it had been before. And so she took
the casket off her knees and set it down.
1075Hera had redirected her intentions.
No longer did Medea waver, no,
she yearned for sunrise, burned to meet the stranger
face-to-face, and offer him the drug.
Over and over she undid the door bolt
1080 (822)and peeped out waiting for the glow of daybreak,
and welcome were the rays that Dawn shot forth.
People throughout the city started stirring,
and Argus bade his brothers stay behind
to monitor the girl’s resolve while he
1085slipped out and went before them to the ship.
Soon as the maiden saw that Dawn had come,
she tied off with her hands the golden tresses
that had been hanging loose in disarray.
Once she had pinched her cheeks and doused her body
1090in fragrant oil, she put a brilliant robe on
and pinned it with exquisite, spiral brooches.
Last of all, she donned a veil—it shone
like silver over her ambrosial features.
And so she pirouetted round her chamber,
1095 (836)oblivious to all the griefs before her
and all those that would multiply with time.
Twelve handmaids, each her age, and each unmarried,
slept in the forecourt of her fragrant chamber.
She summoned them and bade them harness mules
1100beneath a cart to bring her to the goddess
Hecate’s handsome temple. When her handmaids
had gone to rig the cart, Medea opened
the hollow casket and removed a tincture,
a drug called Prometheon.
If a man
1105should first appease the Lone-Begotten Virgin
with nighttime sacrifice and then anoint
his body with this extract, he would be
invulnerable against all strokes of bronze,
unscorchable by blasts of blazing fire,
1110 (850)and greater for a day than any mortal
in might and bravery.
The herb first sprouted
after the flesh-devouring eagle dripped
tortured Prometheus’ bloody ichor
onto the rugged slopes of the Caucasus.
1115Twin stalks emerged and then, atop them, flowers
closest in hue to the Corycian crocus.
Their taproots looked like freshly slaughtered flesh;
their resin, like a mountain oak’s black sap.
Before the girl had used a Caspian seashell
1120to catch the resin and prepare the potion,
she had bathed in ever-flowing waters
seven times and seven times invoked
Brimo the Youth Nurse, Brimo Dark Traverser
and Netherworldly Queen. The night was starless,
1125 (863)and the girl had donned a pitch-black mantle.
When the Titanian root was severed, Earth
shook from her depths and raised a groan because
the son of Iapetus himself was groaning,
his soul twisted with pain. Such was the drug
1130she took and placed inside the fragrant band
supporting her ambrosial breasts.
She left
her room and climbed aboard the swift-wheeled cart.
When two handmaids had climbed aboard beside her,
she took the reins and braided whip in hand
1135and drove through town. The other handmaids gripped
a basket at the wagon’s rear and jogged
along the broad cart road, their gauzy skirts
hiked as high up as their shining thighs.
Just as when Leto’s daughter Artemis,
1140 (877)after a bath in the Amnisus River
or the Parthenius’ tepid shallows,
ascends her golden car and rides through hills
behind a team of swift-hooved bucks to visit
steaming and fat-rich cattle sacrifices,
1145a retinue of nymphs beside her, some
assembled from the source of the Amnisus,
others from groves and many-fountained summits
and, everywhere around her as she passes,
the wild creatures fawn and whimper—so
1150the young girls sped through town, and all the people
gave way and shunned the royal maiden’s gaze.
Once she had left the well-built city roads
and traveled through a plain, she reined the mules in
before the shrine, jumped from the smooth-wheeled
wagon,
1155 (890)full of desire, and said to her attendants:
“Goodness, my friends, what a mistake I made!
I never stopped to think it wasn’t safe
with all those strangers roaming through our kingdom.
The whole city is wild with turmoil, so
1160none of the women who attend the temple
have come today. Since we are here, however,
and no one else is coming, let’s delight
our hearts with choral song. Once we have picked
these gorgeous flowers from the tender grass,
1165we shall return at our accustomed hour.
And you will go home rich in gifts today
if you agree to do me one small favor:
Argus, you see, will not stop begging me to—
Chalciope as well—oh, but be sure
1170 (903)to keep the words I tell you to yourselves
so that they never reach my father’s ears—
well, it’s about the stranger who agreed
to undertake the trial of the oxen—
you see, they asked me to accept his gifts
1175and keep him safe in that atrocious contest.
Well, once the terms were set, I bade the stranger
come here alone, apart from his companions,
to meet me face-to-face, so that we girls
might share among ourselves whatever gifts
1180he brings us. We shall give him, in exchange,
a very potent herbal tincture. Please, though,
stand at a distance when the man arrives.”
So she requested, and her subtle words
persuaded all the maids.
As soon as Argus
1185 (913)learned from his brothers that the girl had left
at daybreak for the shrine of Hecate,
he led the son of Aeson out alone,
apart from his companions, through the plain.
And with them went the offspring of Ampycus,
1190Mopsus, an expert at interpreting
bird signs and guiding heroes on their quests.
Never among the men of long ago—
not among all those sired by Zeus himself,
nor among those the other gods begot—
1195had any man appeared as irresistible
to speak with and adore as on that day
Jason appeared. Hera the wife of Zeus
had made him so. Even his comrades marveled
as they admired his radiant appeal,
1200 (925)and Mopsus swaggered as they walked because
he knew already of the trip’s success.
Beside the footpath through the plain there stands,
next to the shrine of Hecate, a poplar
that wears long hair, innumerable leaves.
1205Crows regularly sit and chatter in it,
and one of them was way up toward the crown
flapping its wings as they were walking by.
At Hera’s prompting it insulted Mopsus:
“You are a sorry sort of seer, too stupid
1210to recognize what even children know:
a maiden never tells a gentleman
sweet words of love when others are around.
Get yourself gone, false prophet, bad adviser.
Neither Cypris nor the gentle love gods
1215 (937)breathe their seductive kindnesses your way.”
So spoke the crow in insult. Mopsus, though,
when he had heard the sacred bird’s command,
smiled in reply and said:
“You go on, Jason,
go on and meet the maiden at the temple.
1220Her welcome will be very warm indeed
thanks to the goddess Cypris, who will help you
complete the labor, just as Phineus
the son of Agenor predicted to you.
Argus and I will wait right here until
1225you finish. You alone must state your case
and win her over with convincing phrases.”
So he insisted, under good advisement,
and his companions gave assent at once.
Medea’s heart, however much she sang,
1230 (949)could not escape from thoughts of Jason, Jason.
None of the tunes she tried distracted her
for long. She broke them off in helplessness
and failed to hold her gaze steady and constant
upon her maids. Her head kept swiveling;
1235she kept on staring out along the roadways.
Time and time again the heart convulsed
within her breast as she debated whether
a passing sound was footsteps or the wind.
Soon he appeared. Her longing eyes perceived him
1240rising from the horizon, as the Dog Star,
Sirius, rises from the River Ocean—
mesmerizing, beautiful—to wreak
unspeakable destruction on the flocks.
In just such splendor did the son of Aeson
1245 (961)rise into view, and his arrival leveled
still greater anguish at the lovesick girl.
Her heart dropped from her breast, her eyes were fog,
and hectic redness chafed her cheeks. She lost
the strength to lift her knees and move forward
1250or back. Her soles were rooted to the earth.
Meanwhile the handmaids had withdrawn from them.
The two stood face-to-face, unspeaking, silent
like oaks or lofty pines that stand unrustled
beside each other on a windless day
1255atop a peak, until a gust of wind
rouses them, and they rustle ceaselessly.
under the impact of the gusts of Eros.
Jason could tell the gods had sunk the girl
in madness, so he plied her gently:
1260 (975)“Maiden,
why are you scared to be alone with me?
I’m not like other men, a no-good boaster,
not now or back when I was in my homeland.
Therefore, though you are young, don’t act so wildly
1265bashful before me that you shrink from saying
what you desire, or anything at all.
Since we have come with goodwill toward each other
and meet on hallowed ground where harmful deeds
are sacrilege, speak freely, ask your questions.
1270But please don’t lead me on by saying simply
what I would like to hear, since from the outset
you have assured your sister you will give me
the strength-inspiring potion.
I beseech you
both in your parents’ names and in the names
1275 (986)of holy Hecate and Zeus Upholder
of Suppliants and Strangers. I have come,
a suppliant and stranger, to embrace
your knees in desperation, since alone—
that is, without your favor—I shall never
1280return successful from this wretched contest.
I am prepared to pay you future honor
for your assistance, all the honor due
between two people living far apart,
by glorifying both your name and virtues.
; 1285After my comrades have returned to Greece,
they, too, will spread your fame, as will their mothers
and wives, who right now possibly are sitting
and wailing on the shore. You, you could scatter
their cruel flock of worries on the winds.
1290 (998)Minos’ maiden daughter Ariadne
once rescued Theseus from a deadly trial—
yes, Helius’ daughter Pasiphae,
the sister of your father, was her mother.
Once Minos had recovered from his anger,
1295the girl embarked upon the hero’s ship
and left her fatherland. Even the gods
adored this girl, and a memento of her,
a garland known as Ariadne’s Crown,
revolves among the heavenly constellations
1300at night. The gods will give you thanks as well
if you assist so mighty an assembly
of heroes. Judging from your beauty, you
should be supreme in gentle kindnesses.”
So he addressed her, playing to her pride.
1305 (1008)She dropped her gaze but, as she did, a smile
as sweet as nectar spread across her face.
Her heart had thawed beneath his flattery.
When she looked up at him again, she failed
to find words fit to start with, since she was
1310so keen to tell him everything at once.
All modesty behind her, she removed
the vial of resin from her fragrant bodice,
and he was quick to wrap his hands around it.
He seemed so very pleased. She would have tugged
1315the soul out of her breast and happily
bestowed it on this man who needed her.
Eros had kindled a miraculous
and winning fire on Jason’s golden hair,
and he was ravishing her gaze. Her eyes
1320 (1020)were glinting, and her heart grew warm and melted
like dew on roses in the dawn’s first light.
Each of them awkwardly admired the ground
at times and then at times kept firing glances
at one another, shooting forth desire
1325from underneath their brows. A good while later,
under extreme duress, the girl brought out:
“Please listen. I shall give you some instructions:
Once my father has bestowed upon you
the serpent’s deadly fangs to sow the field,
1330wait for the darkest hour of the night,
then wash your body in a rushing river,
don an all-black mantle, and retire
somewhere alone, apart from your companions,
and dig a wide round hole. Once you have slit