The Phoenix

There is a happy place, far off in the farthest east, where the greatest gate of the eternal sky stands open; yet it is not near the risings of the sun in summer or in winter, but where the sun pours out the day from its spring axis. There a plain spreads out its open stretches; no mound rises there, no hollow valley gapes; but that place stands higher than our mountains, whose ridges are thought lofty, by twice six ells. Here is the grove of the Sun, a wood planted with many trees, green with the glory of never-failing leaves. When the sky blazed with Phaethon's fires, that place was untouched by the flames; and when the flood had drowned the world in its waves, it rose above the waters of Deucalion. Hither come no bloodless diseases, no sick old age,

no cruel death, no harsh fear, no unspeakable crime, no mad desire for wealth, or anger, or frenzy burning with the love of slaughter; bitter grief is absent, and poverty clothed in rags, and sleepless cares, and violent hunger. No storm rages there, no dreadful force of wind, nor does the frost cover the earth with icy dew. No cloud stretches its fleece over the fields, nor does the muddy moisture of water fall from on high. But in the middle there is a spring, which they call by the name “Living,” clear, gentle, rich in sweet waters, which, bursting forth once in each season of the months, waters the whole grove twelve times with its streams. Here a kind of tree, rising on a tall trunk, bears mellow fruits that will not fall to the ground.

This grove, these woods, a unique bird inhabits, the Phoenix: unique, yet it lives, restored by its own death. It obeys and serves Phoebus, a companion worth remembering: this is the office that mother nature gave it to hold. When first the saffron Dawn grows red as she rises, when first she puts the stars to flight with rosy light, three and four times the bird plunges its body into the holy waves, three and four times it sips water from the living stream. It rises and settles on the topmost crown of a lofty tree, the only one that looks down on the whole grove, and, turned toward the new rising of Phoebus as he is born, it waits for his rays and the rising radiance. And when the Sun has struck the threshold of the shining gate, and the light breath of the first light has flashed out,

it begins to pour out the measures of a sacred song and to summon the new light with a wondrous voice, which neither the nightingale's notes nor the musical pipe could match in Cirrhaean measures; nor would the dying swan be thought able to imitate it, nor the tuneful strings of the Cyllenian lyre. After Phoebus has let his horses loose into the open sky of Olympus and, moving on, has brought forth his whole orb, the bird claps three times with repeated beating of its wings and, having three times venerated the fire-bearing head, falls silent. It also marks off the swift hours with sounds that cannot be described, night and day: priestess of the grove and revered minister of the woods, and alone privy to your secrets, Phoebus.

When it has now completed a thousand years of life, and the long ages have made it heavy, in order to renew its fallen life as the span of time declines, it flees the sweet, accustomed resting place of the grove. And when, eager to be born again, it has left the holy places, then it seeks this world, where death holds sway. Long-lived, it directs its swift flight into Syria, to which it itself of old gave the name Phoenice, and through trackless deserts it seeks secluded groves, where some remote wood lies hidden among the glades. Then it chooses a palm, high with airy crown, which has its Greek name, phoenix, from the bird, onto which no harmful living creature can creep, no slippery serpent, nor any bird of prey. Then Aeolus shuts up the winds in hanging caves,

lest they violate the bright air with their blasts, or a cloud gathered by the south wind through the empty spaces of the sky remove the rays of the sun and harm the bird. Then it builds for itself either a nest or a tomb: for it dies that it may live, yet it creates itself. From there it gathers juices and odors from the rich wood, such as the Assyrian gathers, such as the wealthy Arab, such as the Pygmy nations or India plucks, or the Sabaean land produces in its soft bosom. It heaps up cinnamon and the breath of amomum, whose scent carries far, and balsams with mixed leaf; nor is the twig of mild cassia or fragrant acanthus missing, nor the tears and rich drops of frankincense. To these it adds the tender ears of downy nard, and your strength, panacea, partner of myrrh.

At once it places its changeable body in the furnished nest and its withered limbs on that life-giving bed. Then with its beak it pours the juices on its limbs, around and above, about to die amid its own funeral rites. Then amid the various odors it commits its soul, nor does it fear for the faithfulness of so great a deposit. Meanwhile the body, destroyed by a death that gives birth, grows hot, and the heat itself brings forth flame, and it conceives fire from the ethereal light far off: it blazes and, burnt up, dissolves into ashes. These ashes nature gathers as into a mass and fuses them, and the result is like a seed. From this, it is said, there first arises a creature without limbs, and this worm is said to be of a milky color.

It grows, but after a fixed time has passed it falls asleep and gathers itself into the shape of a round egg. And as the moths of the field, when they are fastened by a thread to the rocks, are wont to be changed into a butterfly, so from there it is re-formed into the shape it had before, and the Phoenix sprouts forth from its burst covering. No food granted in our world is its, nor is anyone charged with feeding it while it is unfledged. It sips ambrosial dews of heavenly nectar, which have fallen fine from the star-bearing sky. These it gathers; on these the bird is fed amid the odors, until it brings forth its mature form. But when it has begun to flower in its first youth, it flies out, now to return to its ancestral home.

Yet first, whatever remains of its own body, the bones or ashes and its own remains, it stores with balsam ointment, myrrh, and dissolved frankincense, and rolls them into a ball with its devoted beak. Carrying this in its feet, it hastens to the city of the Sun, and, perched on the altar, sets it forth in the sacred temple. It shows itself wondrous and presents itself to be revered: such is the bird's beauty, so great is its abounding honor. First, its color is such as, under the sign of Cancer, the rind covers over the mellow pomegranate seeds; such as is in the petals that the wild poppy bears, when Flora spreads her garments over the reddening ground. With this covering its shoulders and comely breast gleam; with this its head, with this its neck and the top of its back shine.

Its tail stretches out, marked with tawny metal, and in its spots purple mixed in glows red. A rainbow marks the feathers of its wings from above, as it is wont to paint a cloud from above. It gleams white, set off with green emerald mixed in, and its jewel-like beak opens in pure horn. Its eyes are large (you would think them twin hyacinths), and from the middle of them a bright flame flashes. A radiant crown is fitted to its shining head, recalling the lofty glory of Phoebus' head. Scales marked with tawny metal cover its legs, but a color tints its claws with rosy honor. Its appearance is seen as a blend between the form of the peacock and the painted bird of the Phasis.

The bird that is born in the lands of the Arabs can scarcely equal its size, whether it be beast or bird. Yet it is not slow, like birds that, with great body, have a sluggish gait through their heavy weight, but light and swift, full of royal beauty: such it always shows itself in the sight of men. Egypt comes here to the marvel of so great a sight, and the crowd greets the rare bird with exultation. At once they carve its form in hallowed marble and mark the event and the day with a new inscription. Every kind of flying creature gathers into an assembly; none is mindful of prey, none of fear. Thronged by a chorus of birds, it flies through the heights, and the throng follows, glad in its devoted task.

But when it has reached the breezes of the pure upper air, soon it returns: from there it is hidden in its own places. But the bird of fortunate lot and end, to whom God himself has granted to be born of itself! Whether it is female in sex, or male, or neither, happy is it, which keeps no covenants of Venus. Death is its Venus; its only pleasure is in death: that it may be born, it first desires to die. It is its own offspring, its own father, and its own heir, its own nurse, always its own nursling. It is itself indeed, yet not the same; it is the same, yet not itself, having gained eternal life by the boon of death.