Away, thou
plunderer
accurst!
Aeschylus
O would that in vapour of smoke I might rise to the
clouds of the sky,
That as dust which flits up without wings I might pass
and evanish and die!
I dare not, I dare not abide: my heart yearns, eager
to fly;
And dark is the cast of my thought; I shudder and
tremble for fear.
My father looked forth and beheld: I die of the sight
that draws near.
And for me be the strangling cord, the halter made
ready by Fate,
Before to my body draws nigh the man of my horror
and hate.
Nay, ere I will own him as lord, as handmaid to
Hades I go!
And oh, that aloft in the sky, where the dark clouds
are frozen to snow,
A refuge for me might be found, or a mountain-top
smooth and too high
For the foot of the goat, where the vulture sits lonely,
and none may descry
The pinnacle veiled in the cloud,
the highest and sheerest of all,
Ere to wedlock that rendeth my heart,
and love that is loveless, I fall!
Yea, a prey to the dogs and the birds of the mount
will I give me to be,--
From wailing and curse and pollution it is death,
only death, sets me free:
Let death come upon me before
to the ravisher's bed I am thrust;
What champion, what saviour but death can I find,
or what refuge from lust?
I will utter my shriek of entreaty,
a prayer that shrills up to the sky,
That calleth the gods to compassion,
a tuneful, a pitiful cry,
That is loud to invoke the releaser.
O father, look down on the fight;
Look down in thy wrath on the wronger,
with eyes that are eager for right.
Zeus, thou that art lord of the world,
whose kingdom is strong over all,
Have mercy on us! At thine altar for refuge
and safety we call.
For the race of Aegyptus is fierce,
with greed and with malice afire;
They cry as the questing hounds,
they sweep with the speed of desire.
But thine is the balance of fate,
thou rulest the wavering scale,
And without thee no mortal emprise
shall have strength to achieve or prevail.
Alack, alack! the ravisher--
He leaps from boat to beach, he draweth near!
Away, thou plunderer accurst!
Death seize thee first,
Or e'er thou touch me--off! God, hear our cry,
Our maiden agony!
Ah, ah, the touch, the prelude of my shame.
Alas, my maiden fame!
O sister, sister, to the altar cling,
For he that seizeth me,
Grim is his wrath and stern, by land as on the sea.
Guard us, O king!
[_Enter the_ HERALD OF AEGYPTUS]
HERALD OF AEGYPTUS
Hence to my barge--step swiftly, tarry not.
CHORUS
Alack, he rends--he rends my hair! O wound on
wound!
Help! my lopped head will fall, my blood gush o'er
the ground!
HERALD OF AEGYPTUS
Aboard, ye cursed--with a new curse, go!
CHORUS
Would God that on the wand'ring brine
Thou and this braggart tongue of thine
Had sunk beneath the main--
Thy mast and planks, made fast in vain!
Thee would I drive aboard once more,
A slayer and a dastard, from the shore!
HERALD OF AEGYPTUS
Be still, thou vain demented soul;
My force thy craving shall control.
