ownhill

[ownhill]

A Study of Polites

Polites, died at arc 2 out of 9, whose presence lingered and lingered until it dared to fade away.

He had, what, one full song to his name? Maybe. But I'd argue that it's one of the most important songs in the whole Odyssey.

I asked my sibling once, if they thought Odysseus and his crew would've lived through The Underworld if Odysseus encountered his mother first, without Polites undying optimism to ground him.

The downward spiral of five hundred fifty-eight men, the men he cared for and fought desperately to bring home, who all died in one fell swoop. The men who now spend their afterlife screaming for their captain, asking why he had forsaken them.

Only to immediately transition into a mother's lament? A mother he shed tears for?

Would Odysseus have been able to leave?

I told my sibling that Polites was haunting Odysseus in a way, because every time Odysseus was in the brink of death he hears Polites.

I've said my piece about The Underworld, how he softened the blow of Odysseus learning about his mother's fate.

The next moment would be during Love in Paradise, with Odysseus up on the edge of that cliff. He's beaten down and hopeless, marinated in depression for 7 whole years.

I fully believe he was seconds away from jumping then. The heavy toll of time had numbed him, made the faces and voices of those he love blurry and muffled. He barely heard Calypso's pleas up until she said "open arms" and all at once it floods back to him. You could even hear it in the swell of the music. Polites snaps him awake and, granted, everyone else pipes in but it was Polites that broke the dam.

Then of course during Get in the Water as Odysseus drowns, because how do you fight a god who made it his entire life's goal to spite you. To wait until you're a breath away from the finish line and politely ask you to die. He's holding the lives of your wife and son above your head and he says he won't hurt them if you drowned but how do you know? (Gods are fickle beings after all). Do you take the easy way out and hope Poseidon keeps his word?

With his voice already half faded, aiming for one final push, Polites sings again and I can almost imagine him gently grabbing at Odysseus' arms, slowly pushing him up, and as everyone joins in more hands help. Again, it's not just Polites, but he's always at the forefront isn't he? And Odysseus gets a second wind.

So yeah Polites, the first of his men to die, always the first to help him out of it.