CASSANDRA.
Ah, ah! What is it? There; it is coming clear.
A net … some net of Hell.
Nay, she that lies with him … is she the snare?
And half of his blood upon it. It holds well….
O Crowd of ravening Voices, be glad, yea, shout
And cry for the stoning, cry for the casting out!
SECOND ELDER.
What Fury Voices call’st thou to be hot
Against this castle? Such words like me not.
And deep within my breast I felt that sick
And saffron drop, which creepeth to the heart
To die as the last rays of life depart.
Misfortune comes so quick.
CASSANDRA.
Ah, look! Look! Keep his mate from the Wild Bull!
A tangle of raiment, see;
A black horn, and a blow, and he falleth, full
In the marble amid the water. I counsel ye.
I speak plain … Blood in the bath and treachery!
LEADER.
No great interpreter of oracles
Am I; but this, I think, some mischief spells.
What spring of good hath seercraft ever made
Up from the dark to flow?
’Tis but a weaving of words, a craft of woe,
To make mankind afraid.
CASSANDRA.
Poor woman! Poor dead woman! … Yea, it is I,
Poured out like water among them. Weep for me….
Ah! What is this place? Why must I come with thee….
To die, only to die?
LEADER.
Thou art borne on the breath of God, thou spirit wild,
For thine own weird to wail,
Like to that wingèd voice, that heart so sore
Which, crying alway, hungereth to cry more,
“Itylus, Itylus,” till it sing her child
Back to the nightingale.
CASSANDRA.
Oh, happy Singing Bird, so sweet, so clear!
Soft wings for her God made,
And an easy passing, without pain or tear …
For me ’twill be torn flesh and rending blade.
SECOND ELDER.
Whence is it sprung, whence wafted on God’s breath,
This anguish reasonless?
This throbbing of terror shaped to melody,
Moaning of evil blent with music high?
Who hath marked out for thee that mystic path
Through thy woe’s wilderness?