THEOGONY
An inspiration from Hesiod's Theogony
A Hellenistic
Cosmogony
Of Chaos, not much can be said,
Having neither body
nor head,
Yet, an embodiment of the primeval Void.
Chaos existed alone in
the universe,
In times that could not be worse;
A world without a defined
border,
Chaos was before any established Order.
Chaos became restless and
uttered forth a curse,
Stirring up the substance of the universe;
The
substance eddied about, clashed around and fought,
And this is how Chaos did
begot . . .
Erebus and Nyx, and then Hemera and Air,
All brought forth
without any parental care.
Of Erebus, Chaos' first born son, it is best the
less said,
That personification of that infernal Shade of the dead;
Nyx,
Chaos' daughter, is the opposite of the shiny bright,
As she became goddess
of the eternal darkness of Night.
Erebus, the infernal Shade, and Nyx,
together they did lay,
And brought forth Hemera, the bright goddess of shiny
day.
Chaos observed the coupling of Erebus and Nyx with interest
fair,
He bade Nyx to come join him and together they begot Air.
The
substance of the universe is very much quite prolific,
Chaos and his
offspring thought this quality to be just terrific;
Very, very, very
promiscuous became the goddess of dark Night,
She did couple with all
existing forces in Cosmic sight . . .
Night's activities went through many,
many cycles of courses,
And soon her profuse behavior bought forth many
abstract forces;
Of Night's various offspring, not all are readily
shown,
However, the following list is of those best known:
Morus or
Destiny, the Keres, Hypnus or Sleep,
the Dreams, Momus or Reproach, Oizys or
Distress,
the Moirae, Nemesis, Apate or Deceit, Philotes or
Affection,
Geras or Old Age, Eris or Strife, and lastly the Hesperides.
Of
Night's numerous children, what can we say?
We all know Hemera, the light of
day;
Of Morus also known as destiny, we shalt not bait,
It is best left
unknown the outcome of future fate;
Of the Keres, it is safe to speak,
As
into our cosmic world their actions do often leak . . .
The Keres are spirits
inclined towards violence and battle,
Who think of humankind as just another
herd of cattle;
Homer thought they controlled the destiny of every
hero,
And from their description, you'll wish their number to be zero.
Of
the Keres appearance and features . . .
They are horrible, black-winged
creatures,
With big white teeth and long pointed nails,
A purpose to give
a fright that never fails.
The horror they inspire never ceases,
The
Keres tear corpses into bite-size pieces,
And they drink the blood of the
wounded and dead.
Of their grotesque deeds, does any more need be said?
From the union of Erebus and Nyx, Hypnus did forth leap,
Yes, he is the
godly personification of restful sleep.
Although not oft mentioned, he does
have a twin,
Thanatos or Death, who without, what might have been?
It is
often claimed that Hypnus has wings,
Travelling fast over land and sea, he
sings,
A lullaby to lull humans to sleep,
So that their souls can
peridically return to the cosmic deep.
There be a tale we shall not
hide,
Hypnus also has a softer side,
Aside from his constant flying
feat,
Once upon a time, Endymion he did meet,
She possessed the eyes of a
dove,
And Hypnus soon fell in love.
Endymion was his loving flower,
And
so he gave her a power . . .
Of sleeping with her eyes open,
So that he
could always watch his lover's eyes.
There are the Dreams, children of Hypnus
and Night,
Whatever we could say of them, wouldn't be quite right,
As they
are visitors often to our sleeping sight.
The Dreams are children of much
various kind,
Sometimes bearing you messages from the gods, you'll
find.
They always come to you in a sleeping blind,
Quickly flittering out
of your awakening mind.
Whereforth arises the phenomena of humanity's
shame?
It be from another of Nyx's children, Momus or Reproach or
Blame.
The character of Momus did in time arise to occur,
When Earth
became exhausted by the weight upon her;
The number of humans were
multiplying much too quick,
And humanity's weight was making poor Earth
sick.
Earth spoke to Zeus of her sufferring these past summers,
And of his
chosen pets, he must reduce drastically their numbers.
Zeus thought this all
was a great bore,
So he sent down the Theban War.
This did not solve the
problem for Earth,
And Momus then suggested an unusual birth.
Momus told
Zeus that Thetis should wed,
Thetis should take a mortal husband to
bed;
She would in time give birth to a daughter Helen,
To later be
abducted by Paris, a Trojan princely felon;
This event would set Asia and
Europe into a battle daze,
And the Trojan War will reduce humanity into a
killing haze.
Perhaps, of all Nyx's children the most well known,
The
Moirae or Parcae, alias the Fates, famous to all it will be shown.
The Moirae
were not very distinctive at an early date,
But they came to be personified
as the individual's fate.
At first every individual had a moira as his
own,
But this notion was transferred to the Keres as earlier shown.
It was
the Moirae who showed the Gods their immortal flaw,
As they, the Moirae,
embodied a cosmic law,
A law which even the very gods could not shake,
The
gods of this law dared not break,
For to do so would endanger . . .
The
very equilibrium of all existence.
As the immortal gods realized they were
not entirely free,
The Moirae revealed themselves to humanity as being
three;
Humans came to know them as the three sisters,
Atropus, Clotho, and
Lachesis.
These three sisters regulated each individual's
life,
Determining if they will have happiness or strife,
Perhaps even
wishing one would be better off dead.
The Moirae achieved this by means of a
soul thread;
One Moirae of the thread spun,
The second wound it up,
And
the third snipped the thread when its life was done.
Another of Nyx's
children well known to us,
Is her daughter the abstract concept goddess
Nemesis.
Of humanly misdeeds from Nemesis' sight you can not hide,
But
first let us consider a story from her less serious side;
This tale may or
may not be truth,
As it was told that Nemesis became beloved by Zeus.
She
wanted no part of the god and tried to evade,
But Zeus was persistent and
wanted her body to invade;
Nemesis assumed the shape of many different
form,
Well beyond the keen and disguise of mortal norm,
Some shapes were
tightly wound and others loose,
Eventually she came to take the incarnation
of a goose.
However, Zeus the god took the shape of a swan-sir,
He caught
the goose and coupled with her;
Of Nemesis, an egg she did lay,
Which some
shepherds picked up one day,
The egg was given to Leda to hatch,
Helen and
the Dioscuri were this batch.
As humanity's numbers once again increased
and some became slime,
Nemesis became the goddess who was bent on punishing
their crime;
She's a busy working goddess who takes no recess,
Nemesis is
out to put a damper on and curb all excess.
So beware of Nemesis . . . you
might be fried,
For your excessive good fortune or arrogant
pride.
Remember Croesus of Lydia, powerful and healthy,
Nemesis enticed
him to undertake an expedition . . .
Croesus went to war against Cyrus the
Persian,
And this made of Croesus a slave no longer wealthy.
With Nyx's
children we will soon be done,
The last we will consider are the Nymphs
of the Setting Sun;
The Hesperides were of Nyx's daughters, numbered
three,
With wild abandon, they were quite free;
Their names were: Aegle or
Brightness, Erythia or Scarlet,
And Hesperarethusa or Sunset Glow,
Also of
them some stories we know . . .
The Hesperides did frolic a life lived at its
best,
They lived afar in the extreme west,
Near the foot of Mount Atlas
far from human commotion,
As they lived near the edge of the Ocean.
As
they lived a good life and often under the sun did bask,
The immortal gods
soon assigned them a special task;
A garden with golden apples they were
chosen to guard,
But given the help of a dragon, the work wasn't so
hard;
The Hesperides in harmonious chorus sang,
And a nearby spring spurt
forth ambrosia with a bang.
The sisters' life of immortal ease,
Was not to
be forever without a disease.
Herakles, the Hero, a golden apple did
steal;
And such a remorse over its loss,
Did the Nymphs of the Setting Sun
feel,
They turned into trees:
Elm, Poplar, and Willow; swaying in windy
breeze.
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