Verse
Iliad
Book 23, Line 69 by Samuel Butler (English)
"You sleep, Achilles, and have forgotten me; you loved me living, but now that I am dead you think for me no further. Bury me with all speed that I may pass the gates of Hades; the ghosts [ psukhai ], vain shadows of men that can labor no more, drive me away from them; they will not yet suffer me to join those that are beyond the river, and I wander all desolate by the wide gates of the house of Hades. Give me now your hand I pray you, for when you have once given me my dues of fire, never shall I again come forth out of the house of Hades. Nevermore shall we sit apart and take sweet counsel among the living; the cruel fate which was my birth-right has yawned its wide jaws around me - nay, you too Achilles, peer of gods, are doomed to die beneath the wall of the noble Trojans.
IliadBook 23, Line 69Samuel ButlerEnglishVerse permalinkRead in Book 23
HomerProseID iliad-iliad-butler-en-prose-23-69