HKB
To aid thee also home ...
[she goes to one after another, and presently kneels embracing the knees of the LEADER.]
I make my prayer By that right hand; to thee, too, by that dear Cheek; by thy knees; by all that is not here Of things beloved, by mother, father, child-- Thou hadst a child!--How say ye? Have ye smiled Or turned from me? For if ye turn away, I and my brother are lost things this day.
LEADER. Be of good heart, sweet mistress. Only go To happiness. No child of man shall know From us thy secret. Hear me, Zeus on high!
IPHIGENIA (rising). God bless you for that word, and fill your eye With light!--
[turning to ORESTES and PYLADES.]
But now, to work! Go thou, and thou, In to the deeper shrine. King Thoas now Should soon be here to question if the price Be yet paid of the strangers' sacrifice.
[ORESTES and PYLADES go in.]
Thou Holy One, that on the shrouded sand Of Aulis saved me from a father's hand Blood-maddened, save me now, and save these twain. Else shall Apollo's lips, through thy disdain, Be no more true nor trusted in men's eyes. Come from the friendless shore, the cruel skies, Come back: what mak'st thou here, when o'er the sea A clean and joyous land doth call for thee?
[she follows the men into the temple.]
CHORUS.
[STROPHE I.]
Bird of the sea rocks, of the bursting spray, O halcyon bird, That wheelest crying, crying, on thy way; Who knoweth grief can read the tale of thee: One love long lost, one song for ever heard And wings that sweep the sea.
Sister, I too beside the sea complain, A bird that hath no wing. Oh, for a kind Greek market-place again, For Artemis that healeth woman's pain; ' Here I stand hungering. Give me the little hill above the sea, The palm of Delos fringed delicately, The young sweet laurel and the olive-tree Grey-leaved and glimmering; O Isle of Leto, Isle of pain and love; The Orbed Water and the spell thereof; Where still the Swan, minstrel of things to be, Doth serve the Muse and sing!
[ANTISTROPHE I.]
Ah, the old tears, the old and blinding tears I gave God then, When my town fell, and noise was in mine ears Of crashing towers, and forth they guided me Through spears and lifted oars and angry men Out to an unknown sea. They bought my flesh with gold, and sore afraid I came to this dark East To serve, in thrall to Agamemnon's maid, This Huntress Artemis, to whom is paid The blood of no slain beast; Yet all is bloody where I dwell, Ah me! Envying, envying that misery That through all life hath endured changelessly. For hard things borne from birth Make iron of man's heart, and hurt the less. 'Tis change that paineth; and the bitterness Of life's decay when joy hath ceased to be That makes dark all the earth.
Behold, [STROPHE 2.] Two score and ten there be Rowers that row for thee, And a wild hill air, as if Pan were there, Shall sound on the Argive sea, Piping to set thee free.
Or is it the stricken string Of Apollo's lyre doth sing Joyously, as he guideth thee To Athens, the land of spring; While I wait wearying?
Oh, the wind and the oar, When the great sail swells before, With sheets astrain, like a horse on the rein; And on, through the race and roar, She feels for the farther shore.
Ah me, [ANTISTROPHE 2.] To rise upon wings and hold Straight on up the steeps of gold Where the joyous Sun in fire doth run, Till the wings should faint and fold O'er the house that was mine of old: