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Seven tripods hauled from the tents, as promised,
twenty burnished cauldrons, a dozen massive stallions.
They quickly brough out women, flawless, skilled in crafts,
seven, and Briseis in all her beauty made the eighth.
Then Odysseus weighed out ten full bars of gold
and led the princes back, laden with other gifts,
and they set them down amid the meeting grounds.
Agamemnon rose to his feet.
He scanned the vaulting skies as his voice rang in prayer:
"Zeus be my witness first, the highest, best of gods!
The Earth, the Sun, and Furies stalking the world below
to wreak revenge on the dead who broke their oaths -
I swear I never laid a hand on the girl Briseis,
I never forced her to serve my lust in bed
or perform some other task...
Briseis remained untouched within my tents."
And so Briseis returned, like golden Aphrodite,
but when she saw Patroclus lying torn by the bronze
she flung herself on his body, gave a piercing cry
and with both hands clawing deep at her breasts,
her soft throat and lovely face, she sobbed,
a woman like a goddess in her grief, "Patroclus -
dearest joy of my heart, my harrowed broken heart!
I left you alive the day I left these shelters,
now I come back to find you fallen, captain of armies!"
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