Odyssey 5.47 · Book 5, lines 47–49
The wand that charms and wakes
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εἵλετο δὲ ῥάβδον, τῇ τʼ ἀνδρῶν ὄμματα θέλγει, ὧν ἐθέλει, τοὺς δʼ αὖτε καὶ ὑπνώοντας ἐγείρει. τὴν μετὰ χερσὶν ἔχων πέτετο κρατὺς ἀργεϊφόντης.
And he took his wand, with which he charms the eyes of men, whomever he wishes, and rouses them again, even the sleeping. Holding it in his hands, the mighty Argeiphontes flew.
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The setting
Hermes completes his outfitting. He takes up the wand with which he can charm human eyes into sleep or wake sleepers again — the staff of the god who guides souls — and, holding it, takes flight.
A note on this passage
Hermes takes up his second implement, the wand, and the poem names its double power: it charms men's eyes shut and it wakes them again. Then, staff in hand, the strong god takes flight.
The wand's two functions are the same gesture read forward and backward — to lay a mind to sleep and to call it awake. It is the tool of the god who moves between worlds, and above all the ψυχοπομπός, the guide of souls down to death and, uniquely, back. Homer does not press the point here; he simply lets the instrument that governs the border of consciousness be the thing Hermes carries to the threshold of Calypso's cave, where a living man is being kept as if asleep from his own life.
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