Odysseus and the Sirens

A strange order rang out across the deck, so strange that no soldier aboard had ever heard one like it. From this moment on, whatever their captain said, whatever he shouted, however he begged, they all had to turn a deaf ear and never untie him. No one was to obey the very man who was giving them the order.

The man who gave that order was Odysseus, a king still trying to find his way home to the island of Ithaca after many long years away. The old tale goes that, on that hard voyage, he and his crew once landed on the island of a goddess named Circe. She helped them make ready to sail on. Before she sent them off, Circe took Odysseus aside and warned him about a danger still waiting ahead. That danger did not come from monsters, and it did not come from storms. It came from the most beautiful thing a human ear could ever hear.

Circe told him that out on the sea ahead lay an island where the Sirens sang. Their singing was so sweet that no sailor who had ever heard it had kept his reason. Some sailors had heard that song and could not resist it, and they never came home again. Odysseus listened in silence. Then he asked whether there was any way to cross those waters and still keep his crew safe.

Circe had a way. He was to take beeswax, she said, and roll it into small, soft balls. Then he was to press them tightly into the ears of every one of his companions, so that not one of them could catch a single note of music. As for Odysseus, if he wished to hear that song for himself, he had to let his companions bind him to the mast, and bind him tight. He had to tell them beforehand what to do once the ship drew near the island. Whatever he said, whatever signs he made, however he pleaded, they must never untie him. They could set him free only when the ship had passed the island completely.

The ship left the shore, carrying Circe's warning with it. Odysseus gave his crew that strange order. Then he rolled the soft beeswax into balls and pressed them hard into the ears of his companions, one by one. At last the whole ship sank into a deep silence. The only sound left was the steady splash of oars in the water. Odysseus stood by the mast and let them wind the rope around him, loop after loop, around his chest and around his arms. They pulled it tight against the mast until he could no longer move at all.

The sea that day was strangely calm, without a single ripple, as if the water itself were holding its breath and waiting. The ship glided on, and every man was silent behind the wax that sealed his ears. Then, from far away, through that still air, a sound came drifting toward them. It was faint at first, then clearer with every stroke of the oars. It was the song of the Sirens.

Not one of the companions of Odysseus heard anything, because their ears had been sealed in advance. But Odysseus heard every single note. The singing was so beautiful that his chest tightened, and a fierce longing rose up inside him. He was no longer himself. The song drove him to come closer, to hear it more clearly, to reach the very source of that wondrous sound, whatever the cost might be. He struggled against the ropes, and they dug deep into his skin as he strained with all his strength to break free. He turned his eyes toward his crew, shouting, signaling, begging them to untie him.

But his companions remembered only one thing: the order Odysseus had given them before the song had even begun. They did not loosen a single rope. Instead, a few of them stepped forward and pulled the loops around him even tighter. Then they went back to their places at the oars and kept rowing steadily, their eyes fixed straight ahead. Not one of them looked back at their captain, straining against the mast.

The ship sailed on, holding its course without slowing down at all. Each stroke of the oars carried it farther from the island of the Sirens. The song, still just as sweet, now grew fainter with every stroke. At last it was only a thin thread of sound, and then it was gone.

Only when not a single note could be heard any longer did Odysseus feel his heart grow calm. The fierce longing slowly melted away, and a feeling of relief spread through his whole body. He signaled to his companions that the danger had passed. One by one, they took the wax out of their ears, and the sound of the waves and the wind came rushing back after a long silence. They stepped forward and unwound the ropes around Odysseus, loop by loop, until he stood free once more. He was still breathing hard from everything he had just been through.

Behind them, the island of the Sirens faded into the open sea, until it was only a smudge on the horizon. The rope they had just untied lay coiled at the foot of the mast, limp, no longer holding anyone. The ship sailed on, carrying Odysseus and his companions farther along the long voyage home to Ithaca.