For Hector, son of Priam, king of Troy,
whom proud Achilles claimed as spoils of slaughter,
there would have been no homage shown, no quarter,
had the old king not pleaded for his boy,
to find in due obsequy bitter joy,
to mourn his city, ash upon the water,
and mourn the fate of every Trojan daughter,
at hands that came in vengeance, to destroy.
In Homer's version, grace redeems blind rage,
barbarity can yet be tamed by honour;
the bloodlust that no carnage can assuage
is stayed by proof of dignity and valour:
would that it could be so, lest this, our age,
should sink beneath the quagmire of its squalor.
Dedicated to the victims of Abu Ghraib,
2003-2004.