Odyssey 10.508 · Book 10, lines 508–510
Where Ocean's stream gives out
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Circe — ἀλλʼ ὁπότʼ ἂν δὴ νηὶ διʼ Ὠκεανοῖο περήσῃς, ἔνθʼ ἀκτή τε λάχεια καὶ ἄλσεα Περσεφονείης, μακραί τʼ αἴγειροι καὶ ἰτέαι ὠλεσίκαρποι,
But when you have crossed with your ship through Ocean, there is a low shore and the groves of Persephone, tall poplars and willows that shed their fruit,
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The setting
Circe begins the landing directions. Once the ship has been carried across the world-encircling river of Ocean, Odysseus will come to a bleak, low shore, the grove of Persephone at the world's edge.
A note on this passage
The directions reach the far side of the world. Ocean is not a sea but the river that rings the whole earth; to cross it is to leave the living world behind. On the other bank is a low shore and the sacred grove of the queen of the dead.
The trees are chosen, not decoration. The willows are called "fruit-losing," dropping their seed before it ripens, and the whole grove belongs to Persephone. At the threshold of the dead the poem plants barren trees, growth that comes to nothing, a landscape of sterility that names where you are before a single ghost appears. The block breaks off here, mid-sentence, on the edge of the underworld.
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