All 25 Uses of
poise
in
The Odyssey
- "Why, mother,"
poised Telemachus put in sharply, "why deny
our devoted bard the chance to entertain us
any way the spirit stirs him on?†p. 88.9
- Poised Telemachus answered,
filled with heart, the heart Athena herself inspired,
to ask for the news about his father, gone so long,
and make his name throughout the mortal world.†p. 109.9
- That night we barely slept,
seething with hard feelings against our own comrades,
for Zeus Was brooding over us, poised to seal our doom ...
At dawn, half of us hauled our vessels down to sea,
we stowed our plunder, our sashed and lovely women.†p. 112.3
- And with all the poise he had, Telemachus replied,
"Son of Atreus, King Menelaus, captain of armies,
I came in the hope that you can tell me now
some news about my father.†p. 134.5
- They're poised to cut Telemachus down with bronze swords
on his way back home.†p. 146.9
- Hearing that,
Alcinous, poised in all his majesty, took the hand
of the seasoned, worldly-wise Odysseus, raised him up
from the hearth and sat him down in a burnished chair,
displacing his own son, the courtly Lord Laodamas
who had sat beside him, the son he loved the most.†p. 185.1
- Poised in his majesty, Alcinous led the way
to Phaeacia's meeting grounds, built for all
beside the harbored ships.†p. 191.3
- Around him cries of the dead rang out like cries of birds,
scattering left and right in horror as on he came like night,
naked bow in his grip, an arrow grooved on the bowstring,
glaring round him fiercely, forever poised to shoot.†p. 269.6
- Just as an angler poised on a jutting rock
flings his treacherous bait in the offshore swell,
whips his long rod—hook sheathed in an oxhorn lure—
and whisks up little fish he flips on the beach-break,
writhing, gasping out their lives ...so now they writhed,
gasping as Scylla swung them up her cliff and there
at her cavern's mouth she bolted them down raw—
screaming out, flinging their arms toward me,
lost in that mortal struggle ...
Of all the pitiful things I've had to witness,
suffering, searching out the pathways of the sea,
this wrenched my heart the most.†p. 279.2
- The Phaeacians all fell silent, hushed,
his story holding them spellbound down the shadowed halls
until Alcinous found the poise to say, "Odysseus,
now that you have come to my bronze-floored house,
my vaulted roofs, I know you won't be driven
off your course, nothing can hold you back—
however much you've suffered, you'll sail home.†p. 286.2
- He sits at ease in the halls of Menelaus,
bathed in endless bounty ...True enough,
some young lords in a black cutter lurk in ambush,
poised to kill the prince before he reaches home,
but I have my doubts they will.†p. 300.5
- Picked men of the suitors lie in ambush, grim-set
in the straits between Ithaca and rocky Same,
poised to kill you before you can reach home,
but I have my doubts they will.†p. 320.5
- Telemachus answered shrewdly, full of poise,
"Two great champions, those you name, it's true.†p. 346.9
- Poised or on the prowl, learning of these rank crimes
he's sowing seeds of ruin for all your suitors.†p. 359.5 *
- "Stop, Eumaeus,"
poised Telemachus broke in quickly now,
"don't waste so much breath on Antinous here.†p. 367.0
- But now the goddess Athena with her glinting eyes
inspired Penelope, Icarius' daughter, wary, poised,
to display herself to her suitors, fan their hearts,
inflame them more, and make her even more esteemed
by her husband and her son than she had been before.†p. 381.2
- The young prince, keeping his poise, replied,
"I swear by Zeus, Agelaus, by all my father suffered—
dead, no doubt, or wandering far from Ithaca these days—
I don't delay my mother's marriage, not a moment,
I press her to wed the man who takes her heart.†p. 421.6
- The goddess Athena with her blazing eyes
inspired Penelope, Icarius' daughter, wary, poised,
to set the bow and the gleaming iron axes out
before her suitors waiting in Odysseus' hall—
to test their skill and bring their slaughter on.†p. 424.2
- He stood at the threshold, poised to try the bow ...
Three times he made it shudder, straining to bend it,
three times his power flagged—but his hopes ran high
he'd string his father's bow and shoot through every iron
and now, struggling with all his might for the fourth time,
he would have strung the bow, but Odysseus shook his head
and stopped him short despite his tensing zeal.†p. 428.5
- His turn first ...
Picking up the weapon now and the swift arrow,
he stood at the threshold, poised to try the bow
but failed to bend it.†p. 429.2
- "Mother,"
poised Telemachus broke in now, "my father's bow—
no Achaean on earth has more right than I
to give it or withhold it, as I please.†p. 435.4
- Off they ran to the storeroom, unseen by him insideMelanthius, rummaging after arms, deep in a dark recess
as the two men took their stand, either side of the doorposts,
poised till the goatherd tried to cross the doorsill ...
one hand clutching a crested helmet, the other
an ample old buckler blotched with mildew,
the shield Laertes bore as a young soldier once
but there it lay for ages, seams on the handstraps split—
Quick, they rushed him, seized him, haled him back by the hair,
flung him down on the floor, writhing with terror, bound him
hand and foot with a chafing cord, wrenched his limbs
back, back till the joints locked tight—
just as Laertes' cunning son comma†p. 445.2
- There he sat, leaning against the great central column,
eyes fixed on the ground, waiting, poised for whatever words
his hardy wife might say when she caught sight of him.†p. 458.6
- Only Telemachus
urged him to take it up, and once he got it
in his clutches, long-suffering great Odysseus
strung his bow with ease and shot through all the axes,
then, vaulting onto the threshold, stood there poised, and pouring
his flashing arrows out before him, glaring for the kill,
he cut Antinous down, then shot his painful arrows
into the rest of us, aiming straight and true,
and down we went, corpse on corpse in droves.†p. 473.9
- So Zeus decreed
and launched Athena already poised for action—
down she swept from Olympus' craggy peaks.†p. 483.7
Definitions:
-
(1)
(poise) calm, confident, and in control—especially in movement, behavior, or when ready to act
-
(2)
(meaning too rare to warrant focus) meaning too rare to warrant focus:
Much more rarely, poise is a technical word referencing a unit of dynamic viscosity.