You are still young to be thus weary of life.
Alcmena
There comes to every man a sudden time
When he undoes the bolts that bar his heart
Displaying hidden shame and scars concealed.
Such season is the present. Hear me now;
For I am sick and pale with lingering
Over a mystery that has no clue
Created idly by an idle brain.
Astrologers, thrice mighty in yourselves,
Say whence crept into me this discontent,
This fretfulness of mine. Say whence arose
My malady, so cunning in its ways,
That I tormented have no skill to guide
My doctors to the secret. Day by day
I feel the heavy burden of the flesh
Grow heavier. Your words rang true indeed.
Though I am young, I am grown weary of life.
The tedious cycle of each passing day
Like streams of dripping tears from blinded eyes
Falls in the cup of my calamity;
While thoughts, such as you guess, are often here,
Bringing a sweet temptation.
I have tried
All means of remedy. This perfumed air,
This gold and ivory, these purple robes
Have caused no change. The mute insistent hours
Wait for me still, interminably slow.
And, as in mental pain a man will crave
For any fierce sensation of the flesh
To rid his agony, so I have craved
The frenzied lashing of tempestuous rain,
The heat of flame, the sharpened fang of frost.
I have gone forth at midnight with no robe,
And walked bare-footed over stony ground
While wind and rain have done their worst on me.
I have kissed flame and held these hands in fire;
These hands have taken the scourge, that is for slaves,
To beat my body. Hear then all my curse.
Neither the blade of sharp-projecting flint
Nor wind nor rain nor burning tongue of flame
Nor knotted scourge can leave a mark on me.
These lips are no less red since they were kissed
By glowing coal; these hands are yet untorn.
Such is my fate, with flesh insensible
To suffer from a mind which has no love
And no distraction. Have it as you will,
I am a shipwreck far on lonely seas
With neither oars aboard, nor land in sight,
Nor mast, nor mast for fluttering rags of sail.
First Astrologer
When you have seen the solemn moon in tears
With long green tresses dipped in a purple sea,
And noted in each tear a breaking heart,
A lump of salty crystal, then your dreams
Will give you counsel which we cannot give.
Second Astrologer
We are empowered to tell you what has been
And what shall be, but this created image
Of your own thought eludes our groping hand.
Third Astrologer
Soon he shall come to you!
That stung your heart?