I couldn’t speak. I felt that the war was forever between us and I hated those years, those battles, the lines on his face. My hate was there, between us. Then, then, tears came to his eyes. Silently, he wept. And I drew him to me.
I heard the wind cross over his house.
Voices shuffled below us in the courtyard, the excited voices of the caretakers, the idle, the hangers-on. I could imagine their leers, their whispers. I lifted his face toward mine and kissed him, his heavy beard sticking my mouth.
There was a sob—a broken gasp. How ill he looked, how tired...
“You must lie down, Alcaeus. Come, I’ll help you.”
And when he was settled, I brought him water.
“Water...there hasn’t been much water these last few days at sea...”
P
So he had come home, “homeward from earth’s far end,” on the shield of blindness. I saw him next day and the next, but he seemed strange, withdrawn. I found two of his servants but he wasn’t interested.
I thought of him as old. But was he old? Age was in his scars, in his streaked hair and beard, the hands lifting and settling awkwardly.