“Theas says you’re betrothed.” It had been on my mind; I did not think our father would have considered her wishes, if the estate was right. This was so; but by luck she was pleased with the young man, who it seemed had courted her prettily, sending her gifts and garlands as if they had been free to choose. “He’s here now,” she said, lighting up; I could see she was less shy of him already than she was of me. “Midylos, the son of Bacchylides.”
It was the father, I now remembered, to whom mine had presented me first of all at the harbor. He’d not thought to show me the youth with whom she was to spend her life.
“He sent me a dish of apples,” she said, going pink, “with a real poem, written. It said I was like an apple at the very top of the tree.” I did not spoil it by hoping he’d quoted right. Of course, she could not read.
When I sought him among the guests, I found him well-favored and no fool, eager for news about the war. Overhearing our talk, other men came up to learn what was happening in Ionia. Before long I had a good-sized audience. I was used to that in Samos. It was only when I saw my father’s eyes on me, that I remembered I’d never been let in with his guests before.
Theas in his wisdom had found me a flautist living in Koressia, and it was there that I trained my chorus. Even so, my brother was at some trouble to bring my father questions about the farm, lest he should come down to oversee me.
Thanks to this, I was happy enough. The flautist had never seen me before; the chorus boys, though all from Iulis, had been young children when I left home. More than half their lives had passed since they had seen Black Sim, if they ever had. I started clear; they were all proud of being trained by a Iulis man, instead of a Koressian as they had been last time.
Though a poet of no distinction, he had not trained them badly. He had even taken them to Delos, where the song, rather than the singing, had lost the prize. They came in together, and you could hear the words.
I’d used for my ode the old story of Apollo and his little brother Hermes, the newborn rogue who crept from his cradle to go cattle-stealing, and crept back there, all innocent, before his lordly brother could trace the herd. Boldly, I had put in two solo passages: a handsome boy for Apollo, and for Hermes, a little treble, bound to win hearts. In those days, breaks in the unison were thought unorthodox. Not long after, Thespis established them in Athens, taking the chief solo himself, from which we have modern tragedy. But Keos is wary of innovations.
The story ends, of course, with Apollo tracking the little thief by the sound of his lyre, which he has just invented. He gives it his big brother in exchange for the stolen cows. Apollo, entranced, forgives him, and tries the new instrument with his divine hand. This is where one shows what the kithara will do.
We rehearsed in the flautist’s orchard, a pleasant place. I took care to bring him some gift each time, for the fruit was ripe and of course the boys were stealing it. It is a great mistake to rehearse indoors, when you will perform in the open air.
Once I walked down to the Apollo temple, in whose precinct the contest would be held. True to Kean simplicity, or cheeseparing if you like, it was one of those antique places most cities had pulled down by now, to rebuild in stone. A cottage-sized naos, with the image at one end of it; a roof of thatch, everything else of timber. Apollo, too; and Keos does not excel in wood-carving. He stood stiff as a tree, his arms straight down at his sides, his hair in round curls like sausages; you could say that he had a face, but not much more. Bright blue eyes, bright red hair. The columns had red shafts and blue capitals; woody knots showed on the shafts. I thought of the Artemis temple at Ephesos, the new Hera one at Samos. I gazed, and began to laugh. Not that the god would despise the offerings of simple worshippers. I was just remembering how scared I’d been of performing in this little town, before people whom this had satisfied. I too, as a child, had entered this barn with awe.
Behind the image I found the mouse-pit, the only bit of marble in the place; the sides were polished, to keep the tenants in. “Bold plunderers of Demeter’s hoarded store,” I said, invoking them with proper gravity. One or two stood up and twitched pink noses at me, in the hope that it was feeding-time.
The flautist—may his shade drink nectar in Elysium!—invited me to his house the night before the contest, to keep rested and fresh, he said. The night before that, my father spent the first half of suppertime complaining he was short-handed for getting in the barley; thinking, clearly, that I could have shortened rehearsals to give a hand. The second half, he went over my list of boys, which he had got from Theas, telling me which of their fathers were of consequence, and ought to be obliged, and which had done him bad turns, making their sons unworthy of any favors. One of these, as it happened, was singing the solo lines for Apollo. I listened in respectful silence.
My mother glanced at me sidelong. I had always been her changeling; now I was double-changed. I knew, though I could not help it, that I was talking like some distant kinsman on a passing visit. I caught Philomache watching me almost with awe. I must tell Kleobis, I thought; it will make him laugh.
Next day I slipped away without ceremony, bidding only Theas goodbye. “I won’t ride down with you,” he said, “you’ll be wanting to think what you’re about, and we’ll be cutting the barley. He’s only short-handed because it’s cropped well this year. I offered up a kid for you, at the turn of the moon; but don’t tell him, he hasn’t missed it.” He strode off through the silver olives.
The flautist knew Ionia well; we spent the evening in pleasant talk, and turned in with a cup of warm neat wine, to settle us. Almost it could have been Ephesos. I slept quite well.
The morning was fine, already smelling of autumn. The smoke of sacrifice hung in the air, sweetened with a little incense; Keos is sparing of such things. There were three or four other choirs, all Kean but one, which came from neighboring Kythnos. We poets exchanged homely gossip, as people do at country festivals. The Keans were curious about me, most of them not having heard of me before, even from my family; but they were more concerned with their own affairs.
The choral odes opened the day; the games and the fair would follow. Robed and wreathed now, we poets stood in the temple porch behaving ourselves. The maiden choruses sat whispering, in their strict matrons’ charge; the boys dropped beetles down one another’s backs, and so on, and were tapped by us poets with our little staffs.
The judges sat on their wooden thrones, brought out from the temple store. There was one, an oldish man, whom the others seemed to defer to. I asked someone why; he murmured that this was a guest of honor from Athens.
The back of my neck tingled. I was to sing before an Athenian.
Despite her wars, nobles against commons, hills against plain, Pisistratos out or in, which made this seem no place for my old master, the name of Athens rang for me, as it had in my boyhood on the Kean hills, looking towards Hymettos. I forgot the Keans, and my worries about whether they would know what I was doing. An Athenian was here.
His name was Prokles. You never hear of him now. But his Lay of Ajax was good, and at one time you heard it everywhere.
I kept my eye on him while the first two choirs were singing (mine would be third) and at one bad passage I saw him blink. This gave me hope.
So much I remember well. But I’ve given my Apollo ode so many times, that my ear hears Athenians, Thessalians, Andrians, Euboians … At any rate, I was told later that the last choir sang badly because mine had put them out of heart. Well, in my time I have made good music before my betters. Why not? Our art is like a wheatfield, the tallest force up the rest. May I no longer live—not that I shall much longer in any case!—when the shortest want to cut the tallest down.