9/11/2010

Copyright David Galalis

Photos at Ground Zero taken yesterday by my brother:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/david_galalis/sets/72157624936246020/

Good Dog

One of the most moving scenes in all of The Odyssey is about Odysseus' dog.  Odysseus has returned to Ithaca, but he's disguised as a beggar.  He returns to his home (or his "manor," as Fitzgerald, the translator of this particular edition calls it--Odysseus is the king of Ithaca, remember), and no one recognizes him, except for faithful Argos...

While he [Odysseus] spoke
an old hound, lying near, pricked up his ears
and lifted up his muzzle.  This was Argos,
trained as a puppy by Odysseus,
but never taken on a hunt before
his master sailed for Troy.  The young men, afterward,
hunted wild goats with him, and hare, and deer,
but he had grown old in his master's absence.
Treated as rubbish now, he lay at last
upon a mass of dung before the gates--
manure of mules and cows, piled there until
fieldhands could spread it on the king's estate.
Abandoned there, and half destroyed with flies,
old Argos lay.