The Horses of Achilles (1897)

       And when they saw that Patroclus was dead,
   who'd been so strong and young and brave,
   Achilles' horses started weeping,
       their immortal natures anguished
   by this work of death which they beheld.
They tossed their heads and shook their long manes,
   stamped their feet upon the ground, and mourned
for Patroclus whom they saw lifeless - levelled -
spirit lost - a lump of cheapened flesh -
       defenceless - without breath -
returned from life into the Void.

       Zeus saw the tears of the immortal
   horses, and he grieved.  "At Peleus's wedding"
   he declared, "I should have been less thoughtless;
       better if I hadn't given him my poor unlucky 
   horses.  What could they expect down there
among the wretched human race Fate uses for her sport?
       You, whom neither death nor old age wait to trap,
   are tortured by such fleeting tragedies.  Men tangle you
   within their torments." -  But the tears of
       these two noble beasts were spilt for
   the eternal tragedy of death.

Note.

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