John Gardner - Jason and Medeia

vanished in the night.

On bare feet then, no candle or torch to light her

way—

her eyes on fire, streaming, clutching old violence— Medeia moved like a cold, slow draught from room to

room,

fingertips brushing the damp stone walls, her white

robe trailing,

light as the touch of a snowflake on dark-tiled floors.

She came

to the room where her children slept, In one bed, side

by side,

and there she paused. She knelt by the bed and looked

at them,

and after a time she reached out gently to touch their

cheeks,

first one, then the other, too lightly to change their

sleep. Her hair

fell soft, glowing, as soft as the children’s hair. Then—

tears

on her cheeks, no sigh, no sound escaping her lips—

she rose

and swiftly returned to her room. The two old slaves

in the house—

the man and a woman — stirred restlessly.

There Jason found her,

lying silent and pale in the moonlight. He kissed her

brow,

too lightly to change her sleep, then quietly undressed

himself

and crawled into bed beside her. Half sleeping already,

he moved

his dark hand over her waist — her arm moved slightly

for him—

and gently cupped her breast. He slept. Medeia’s eyes were open, staring at the wall. They shone like ice,

as bright

as raven’s eyes. The garden, sheeted in fog, was still. A cloudshape formed. It stretched dark wings and

blanketed the moon.

I was alone, leaning on the tree, shivering. I listened

to the wind.

Below the thick, gnarled roots of the oak there was no

firm ground,

but a void, a bottomless abyss, and there were voices—

sounds

like the voices of leaves, I thought, or the babble of

children, or gods.

I made out a shadowy form. The phantom moved toward

me,

floating in the dark like a ship. It reached to me,

touched my hand,

and the tree became an enormous door whose upper

reaches

plunged into space — the ring, the keyhole, the golden

hinges

light-years off. Even as I watched the great door grew. I trembled. The surface of the door was wrought from

end to end

with dragon shapes, and all around the immense beasts there were smaller dragons, and even the pores of the

smaller dragons

were dragons, growing as I watched. Slowly, the door

swung open.

I had come to the house of the gods.

Above the cavern where the dark coiled Father of

Centuries

lay bound, groaning, in chains forged by everlasting fire, Zeus sat smiling, serene as the highest of mountaintops, his eyes like an eagle’s, aware of the four directions.

Beside him—

stately, magnificent, dreadful to behold — Hera sat,

draped

in snakes. Above her lovely head, like a parasol, a cobra flared its hood. It stared with dusty eyes through changing mists. I tightened my grip on my

guide’s hand.

“Goddess, porter, whatever you are,” I whispered,

“shield me!”

“Be still,” she said. I obeyed, trembling, straightening

my glasses,

buttoning up my coat.

The queen of goddesses

had beautiful eyes, as benign and warm as the eyes

of the snake

were malevolent. Her face was radiant with life,

seductive,

as sensuous as the brow of Zeus was intellectual. The thrones were joined by an arm of gold, and on

that arm

Zeus rested his own. The queen’s arm lay on the king’s, and their fingers were interlaced. On Zeus’s shoulder,

a prodigious

birdlike creature perched, half-lion, half-eagle, watching the snake. “What can all this mean?” I asked. My guide

touched her lips.

Suddenly the hall was filled with a teeming sea of gods. Some were like monsters, some had the shapes of trees

or waterfalls;

some were like bulls, others like panthers, elephants,

monkeys,

and some were like men — like kings, queens, beggars,

saintly hermits.

One came in on a litter of finely wrought ebony set with centaurs of ivory and silver — a beautiful goddess

in a robe

of scarlet, open at the front to reveal great pendulous

breasts.

The mortals, her slaves, wore flowers in their hair—

the white hair tangled,

matted like the hair of mad women. They wept and

moaned

as they walked, limping, half-naked, ragged. Their

ankles

clinked and jangled with tarnished jewelry; the perfume they

wore

yellowed the air like woodsmoke. Their chalkgray feet

were crooked,

their eyes were dim, and beneath the stiffening paint,

their faces

were cities destroyed by fire. But whether the bearers

were women

or men, I could not guess. Quick fluttering sparrows flew like swirling leaves in a graveyard, screeching. My

shadowy guide

smiled and inclined her head.

“Not all gods here are wise,”

she said. “They have all their will, all that a creature

can desire:

They feel no hunger, no thirst, no weariness, no fear of

death,

no pain or sorrow or lonely old age. But the grinding

force

of life still burns in them, endlessly restless, driving,

devouring—

the force that blazes in the eyes of the half-starved lion

or swells

the veins of the terrified deer. They can never be rid

of it.

Some, desiring in a state where nothing is left to desire, sink to the sickness of ennui and wallow in vast self-pity like hogs in mire. Some puff up their power, and delight in smashing the will of the weak. A few, like Zeus, grow

wise.

But very few. Observe how the rest crawl through their

days.

At times, to break the tedium, the gods feast.

At times, to break the tedium, the gods fast.

At times they quarrel like dogs. At times they smile and

kiss.

At times they sue to the king with cantankerous

demands. Watch.”

The goddess in scarlet approached the throne of Zeus

and, descending

from her litter, kneeled before him. “O mighty Lord,”

she said,

“hear the prayer of your sorrowful Aphrodite! Cruelly the Queen of Olympos mocks me and makes me a

laughingstock!

I’m ashamed to be seen among gods. They smirk and

ogle, point at me,

whisper behind my back. I filled Medeia’s heart with love, stirred Jason to manly desire, arranged a

pairing

fit to be remembered through endless time and to the

farthest poles

of space. But Hera has overwhelmed me with her

treachery,

cluttering his heart with desires more base, so that all

I’ve done

is nothing, a cloud dispersed! O Great God, Lord of

Thunder,

make him shake off this wickedness!” Her cheeks were

bright

with anger, her dark eyes flashed; her flowing black

hair gleamed

as if even that were in a rage. Yet out of respect for

Hera,

or remembering that Hera was Zeus’s wife, she

controlled herself.

She stretched out her white left arm, her right hand

daintily pressed

to her breast, just over the roseate nipple, as if to quell the terrible quopping of her heart. “Have I ever denied

her power—

her supreme rule over all things physical: ships, rivers, forests, banquets, marriage beds? She fills the world with beauty, goodness, the excitements of danger. At

her command

Ares stirs up the terrors and joys of war. At a word from her, the gods lure men to the highest pinnacles

of feeling—

treasure-hunting, kingdom-snatching. By her pale light alchemists pawn away all they own to untomb the gold in lead, the wolf hunts the lamb, the shepherd attacks