Epic+Simile16

"Salt tears rose from the wells of longing in both men, and cries burst from both as keen and fluttering as those of the great taloned hawk, whose nestlings farmers take before they fly."

What this simile is explaining is that the cries of the two men are like those of two birds who are taken away by farmers before they can even fly, They are therefore loud cries and despairing whimpers of helpless creatures who are exposed for the first time to something they had never experienced before. Such is the case with the small birds who are taken away and such is the case with Odysseus that sees his son for the first time in almost twenty years.