HKB
Yet upright there! Ah the torn flesh and the blood-stained hair; Alas for the kindred's trouble! It falls as fire from a God's hand sped, Two deaths, and mourning double.
HIPPOLYTUS Ah, pain, pain, pain! O unrighteous curse! O unrighteous sire! No hope.--My head is stabbed with fire, And a leaping spasm about my brain. Stay, let me rest. I can no more. O fell, fell steeds that my own hand fed, Have ye maimed me and slain, that loved me of yore? --Soft there, ye thralls! No trembling hands As ye lift me, now!--Who is that that stands At the right?--Now firm, and with measured tread, Lift one accursèd and stricken sore By a father's sinning.
Thou, Zeus, dost see me? Yea, it is I; The proud and pure, the server of God, The white and shining in sanctity! To a visible death, to an open sod, I walk my ways; And all the labour of saintly days Lost, lost, without meaning!
Ah God, it crawls This agony, over me! Let be, ye thralls! Come, Death, and cover me: Come, O thou Healer blest!
But a little more, And my soul is clear, And the anguish o'er! Oh, a spear, a spear! To rend my soul to its rest!
Oh, strange, false Curse! Was there some blood-stained head, Some father of my line, unpunishèd, Whose guilt lived in his kin, And passed, and slept, till after this long day It lights... Oh, why on me? Me, far away And innocent of sin?
O words that cannot save! When will this breathing end in that last deep Pain that is painlessness? 'Tis sleep I crave. When wilt thou bring me sleep, Thou dark and midnight magic of the grave!
ARTEMIS Sore-stricken man, bethink thee in this stress, Thou dost but die for thine own nobleness.
HIPPOLYTUS Ah! O breath of heavenly fragrance! Though my pain Burns, I can feel thee and find rest again. The Goddess Artemis is with me here.
ARTEMIS With thee and loving thee, poor sufferer!
HIPPOLYTUS Dost see me, Mistress, nearing my last sleep?
ARTEMIS Aye, and would weep for thee, if Gods could weep.
HIPPOLYTUS Who now shall hunt with thee or hold thy quiver?
ARTEMIS He dies but my love cleaves to him for ever.
HIPPOLYTUS Who guide thy chariot, keep thy shrine-flowers fresh?
ARTEMIS The accursed Cyprian caught him in her mesh!
HIPPOLYTUS The Cyprian? Now I see it!--Aye, 'twas she.
ARTEMIS She missed her worship, loathed thy chastity!
HIPPOLYTUS Three lives by her one hand! 'Tis all clear now.
ARTEMIS Yea, three; thy father and his Queen and thou.
HIPPOLYTUS My father; yea, he too is pitiable!
ARTEMIS A plotting Goddess tripped him, and he fell.
HIPPOLYTUS Father, where art thou? ... Oh, thou sufferest sore!
THESEUS Even unto death, child. There is joy no more.
HIPPOLYTUS I pity thee in this coil; aye, more than me.
THESEUS Would I could lie there dead instead of thee!
HIPPOLYTUS Oh, bitter bounty of Poseidon's love!
THESEUS Would God my lips had never breathed thereof!
HIPPOLYTUS (gently) Nay, thine own rage had slain me then, some wise!
THESEUS A lying spirit had made blind mine eyes!
HIPPOLYTUS Ah me! Would that a mortal's curse could reach to God!