It was her own live lips that so rebuked him.
But no, that couldn’t be. He said it again,
And turned to the lame tinker.
“We’ll not stop,
For her or anybody. Tell me now—”
Whereat Hephaestus grinned, and Aphrodite,
Stamping her white foot, that all but showed
Immortal through the slipper, let them be.
Yet not for long. The lame one in his room,
That night and every night, was pinched awake