Hecuba.
And I the agèd, where go I,
A winter-frozen bee, a slave
Death-shapen, as the stones that lie
Hewn on a dead man's grave:
The children of mine enemy
To foster, or keep watch before
The threshold of a master's door,
I that was Queen in Troy!
A Woman to Another.
[Strophe 2.
And thou, what tears can tell thy doom?
The Other. The shuttle still shall flit and change
Beneath my fingers, but the loom,
Sister, be strange.
Another (wildly).
Look, my dead child! My child, my love,
The last look. . . .
Another. Oh, there cometh worse.
A Greek's bed in the dark. . . .
Another. God curse
That night and all the powers thereof!Another. Or pitchers to and fro to bear
To some Pirênê on the hill,
Where the proud water craveth still
Its broken-hearted minister.
Another. God guide me yet to Theseus' land,
The gentle land, the famed afar . . .
Another. But not the hungry foam—Ah, never!—
Of fierce Eurotas, Helen's river,
To bow to Menelaus' hand,
That wasted Troy with war!
A Woman.
[Antistrophe 2.
They told us of a land high-born,
Where glimmers round Olympus' roots
A lordly river, red with corn
And burdened fruits.
Another. Aye, that were next in my desire
To Athens, where good spirits dwell . . .
Another. Or Aetna's breast, the deeps of fire
That front the Tyrian's Citadel:
First mother, she, of Sicily
And mighty mountains: fame hath told
Their crowns of goodness manifold. . . .
Another. And, close beyond the narrowing sea,
A sister land, where float enchanted
Ionian summits, wave on wave, And Crathis of the burning tresses
Makes red the happy vale, and blesses
With gold of fountains spirit-haunted
Homes of true men and brave!
Leader.
But lo, who cometh: and his lips
Grave with the weight of dooms unknown:
A Herald from the Grecian ships.
Swift comes he, hot-foot to be done
And finished. Ah, what bringeth he
Of news or judgment? Slaves are we,
Spoils that the Greek hath won!