The Odyssey: The Sirens' Song

[Odysseus]

The crew were on their feet
Briskly, to furl the sail, and stow it; then,
each in place, they posed the smooth oar blades
and sent the white foam scudding by. I carved
a massive cake of beeswax into bits
and rolled them in my hands until they softened
no long task, for a burning heat came down
from Hêlios, lord of high noon. Going forward
I carried wax along the line, and laid it
thick on their ears. They tied me up, then, plumb
amidships, back to the mast, lashed to the mast,
and took themselves again to rowing. Soon,
as we came smartly within hailing distance,
the two Seirênês, noting our fast ship
off their point, made ready, and they sang:

[The Sirens]

This way, oh turn your bows,
Akhaia's glory,
as all the world allows
Moor and be merry.

Sweet coupled airs we sing.
No lonely seafarer
Holds clear of entering
Our green mirror.

Please by each purling note
Like honey twining
From her throat and my throat,
Who lies a-pining?

Sea rovers here take joy
Voyaging onward,
As from our song of Troy
Greybeard and rower-boy
Goeth more learned.

all feats on that great field
In the long warfare,
Dark days the bright gods willed,
Wounds you bore there.

Argos' old soldiery
On Troy beach teeming,
Charmed out of time we see.
No life on earth can be
Hid from our dreaming.

[Odysseus]

The lovely voices in ardor appealing over the water
made me crave to listen, and I tried to say
'Untie me!' to the crew;
but they bent steady to the oars. Then Perimêdês
got to his feet, he and Eurýlokhos,
and passed more line about, to hold me still.
So all rowed on, until the ______
dropped under the seam rim, and their singing dwindled away.

Homer. The Odyssey. Translated by Robert Fitzgerald with Dudley Fitts. (1961) Random House, New York.