The Electra of Euripides | Page 4

well, or speak some sign?Of import to this work of mine and thine.
[_The two men retire into ambush._ ELECTRA _enters, returning from the well._
ELECTRA.
Onward, O labouring tread,?As on move the years;?Onward amid thy tears,?O happier dead!
Let me remember. I am she, [_Strophe_ 1. Agamemnon's child, and the mother of me?Clytemnestra, the evil Queen,?Helen's sister. And folk, I ween,?That pass in the streets call yet my name?Electra.... God protect my shame!?For toil, toil is a weary thing,?And life is heavy about my head;?And thou far off, O Father and King,?In the lost lands of the dead.?A bloody twain made these things be;?One was thy bitterest enemy,?And one the wife that lay by thee.
Brother, brother, on some far shore [_Antistrophe_ 1. Hast thou a city, is there a door?That knows thy footfall, Wandering One??Who left me, left me, when all our pain?Was bitter about us, a father slain,?And a girl that wept in her room alone.?Thou couldst break me this bondage sore,?Only thou, who art far away,?Loose our father, and wake once more....?Zeus, Zeus, dost hear me pray?...?The sleeping blood and the shame and the doom!?O feet that rest not, over the foam?Of distant seas, come home, come home!
What boots this cruse that I carry? [_Strophe_ 2. O, set free my brow!?For the gathered tears that tarry?Through the day and the dark till now,?Now in the dawn are free,?Father, and flow beneath?The floor of the world, to be?As a song in she house of Death:?From the rising up of the day?They guide my heart alway,?The silent tears unshed,?And my body mourns for the dead;?My cheeks bleed silently,?And these bruised temples keep?Their pain, remembering thee?And thy bloody sleep.
Be rent, O hair of mine head!
As a swan crying alone?Where the river windeth cold,?For a loved, for a silent one,?Whom the toils of the fowler hold,?I cry, Father, to thee,?O slain in misery!
The water, the wan water, [_Antistrophe_ 2. Lapped him, and his head?Drooped in the bed of slaughter?Low, as one weari��d;?Woe for the edg��d axe,?And woe for the heart of hate,?Houndlike about thy tracks,?O conqueror desolate,?From Troy over land and sea,?Till a wife stood waiting thee;?Not with crowns did she stand,?Nor flowers of peace in her hand;?With Aegisthus' dagger drawn?For her hire she strove,?Through shame and through blood alone;?And won her a traitor's love.
[_As she ceases there enter from right and left the_ CHORUS, _consisting of women of Argos, young and old, in festal dress_.
CHORUS.
_Some Women._
Child of the mighty dead, [_Strophe_. Electra, lo, my way?To thee in the dawn hath sped,?And the cot on the mountain grey,?For the Watcher hath cried this day:?He of the ancient folk,?The walker of waste and hill,?Who drinketh the milk of the flock;?And he told of Hera's will;?For the morrow's morrow now?They cry her festival,?And before her throne shall bow?Our damsels all.
ELECTRA.
Not unto joy, nor sweet?Music, nor shining of gold,?The wings of my spirit beat.?Let the brides of Argos hold?Their dance in the night, as of old;?I lead no dance; I mark?No beat as the dancers sway;?With tears I dwell in the dark,?And my thought is of tears alway,?To the going down of the day.?Look on my wasted hair?And raiment.... This that I bear,?Is it meet for the King my sire,?And her whom the King begot??For Troy, that was burned with fire
And forgetteth not?
CHORUS.
_Other Women._
Hera is great!--Ah, come, [_Antistrophe_. Be kind; and my hand shall bring?Fair raiment, work of the loom,?And many a golden thing,?For joyous robe-wearing.?Deemest thou this thy woe?Shall rise unto God as prayer,?Or bend thine haters low??Doth God for thy pain have care??Not tears for the dead nor sighs,?But worship and joy divine?Shall win thee peace in thy skies,?O daughter mine!
ELECTRA.
No care cometh to God?For the voice of the helpless; none?For the crying of ancient blood.?Alas for him that is gone,?And for thee, O wandering one:?That now, methinks, in a land?Of the stranger must toil for hire,?And stand where the poor men stand,?A-cold by another's fire,?O son of the mighty sire:?While I in a beggar's cot?On the wrecked hills, changing not,?Starve in my soul for food;?But our mother lieth wed?In another's arms, and blood
Is about her bed.
LEADER.
On all of Greece she wrought great jeopardy,?Thy mother's sister, Helen,--and on thee.
[ORESTES _and_ PYLADES _move out from their concealment_; ORESTES _comes forward_: PYLADES _beckons to two_ ARMED SERVANTS _and stays with them in the background_.
ELECTRA.
Woe's me! No more of wailing! Women, flee!?Strange arm��d men beside the dwelling there?Lie ambushed! They are rising from their lair.?Back by the road, all you. I will essay?The house; and may our good feet save us!
ORESTES (_between_ ELECTRA _and the hut_).
Stay,?Unhappy woman! Never fear my steel.
ELECTRA (_in utter panic_).
O bright Apollo! Mercy! See, I kneel;?Slay me not.
ORESTES.
Others I have yet to slay?Less dear than thou.
ELECTRA.
Go from me! Wouldst thou lay?Hand on a body that is not for thee?
ORESTES.
None is there I would touch more