An Abandoned Spirit

Elpenor, hapless crew member, tells his story:

It was the middle of the day, and it was blistering hot as I lay on the roof of Circe’s house. It had been a long year of waiting to leave this place, but when I looked up, the ship was not in sight, startling me. I reached for the ladder I had climbed up on, but it wasn’t there. I fell--fell straight to the solid ground in front of Circe’s door. As I tried to get up, I realized my body wasn’t moving. I was stuck, paralyzed; my legs hung over my head as I lay on my chest, one arm under my stomach, the other dislocated and unable to be seen from the position in which I lay. Circe gazed out the window but acted as if she didn’t see me, turned and went on about her business. Soon my soul was taken to the underworld, down to Hades, Lord of the Dead, as my body lay mangled on Circe’s island.

Not long after that day of my death, I was floating with all the other spirits of the underworld, when suddenly Odysseus and the crew showed up, wondering how I got there faster than they did. They soon realized after Odysseus put his arm through me, that I was dead. Frantically they asked what had happened, so I told them that they had set sail without me, taking the ladder that I was using. I had fallen off Circe’s roof and broken my neck. “You left me there to die without any proper burial when you could have helped me out. You left me! Will you please go back to Circe’s island and give me a proper burial?”

With that having been told, Odysseus promised that they would go back and give me the proper burial that I deserved. After that I never saw them again.

Author: Matt