Chapter 5

Wherefore I will not that these twain, O gods, Die as a dog dies, eaten of creeping things, Abominable, a loathing; but though dead Shall they have honour and such funereal flame As strews men's ashes in their enemies' face And blinds their eyes who hate them: lest men say, 'Lo how they lie, and living had great kin, And none of these hath pity of them, and none Regards them lying, and none is wrung at heart, None moved in spirit for them, naked and slain, Abhorred, abased, and no tears comfort them:' And in the dark this grieve Eurythemis, Hearing how these her sons come down to her Unburied, unavenged, as kinless men, And had a queen their sister. That were shame Worse than this grief. Yet how to atone at all I know not, seeing the love of my born son, A new-made mother's new-born love, that grows From the soft child to the strong man, now soft Now strong as either, and still one sole same love, Strives with me, no light thing to strive withal; This love is deep, and natural to man's blood, And ineffaceable with many tears. Yet shall not these rebuke me though I die, Nor she in that waste world with all her dead, My mother, among the pale flocks fallen as leaves, Folds of dead people, and alien from the sun; Nor lack some bitter comfort, some poor praise, Being queen, to have borne her daughter like a queen, Righteous; and though mine own fire burn me too, She shall have honour and these her sons, though dead. But all the gods will, all they do, and we Not all we would, yet somewhat, and one choice We have, to live and do just deeds and die.

CHORUS.

Terrible words she communes with, and turns Swift fiery eyes in doubt against herself, And murmurs as who talks in dreams with death.

ALTHAEA.

For the unjust also dieth, and him all men Hate, and himself abhors the unrighteousness, And seeth his own dishonour intolerable. But I being just, doing right upon myself, Slay mine own soul, and no man born shames me. For none constrains nor shall rebuke, being done, What none compelled me doing, thus these things fare. Ah, ah, that such things should so fare, ah me, That I am found to do them and endure, Chosen and constrained to choose, and bear myself Mine own wound through mine own flesh to the heart Violently stricken, a spoiler and a spoil, A ruin ruinous, fallen on mine own son. Ah, ah, for me too as for these; alas, For that is done that shall be, and mine hand Full of the deed, and full of blood mine eyes, That shall see never nor touch anything Save blood unstanched and fire unquenchable.

CHORUS.

What wilt thou do? what ails thee? for the house Shakes ruinously; wilt thou bring fire for it?

ALTHAEA.

Fire in the roofs, and on the lintels fire. Lo ye, who stand and weave, between the doors, There; and blood drips from hand and thread, and stains Threshold and raiment and me passing in Flecked with the sudden sanguine drops of death.

CHORUS.

Alas that time is stronger than strong men, Fate than all gods: and these are fallen on us.

ALTHAEA.

A little since and I was glad; and now I never shall be glad or sad again.

CHORUS.

Between two joys a grief grows unaware.

ALTHAEA.

A little while and I shall laugh; and then I shall weep never and laugh not any more.

CHORUS.

What shall be said? for words are thorns to grief. Withhold thyself a little and fear the gods.

ALTHAEA.

Fear died when these were slain; and I am as dead, And fear is of the living; these fear none.

CHORUS.

Have pity upon all people for their sake.

ALTHAEA.

It is done now, shall I put back my day?

CHORUS.

An end is come, an end; this is of God.

ALTHAEA.

I am fire, and burn myself, keep clear of fire.

CHORUS.

The house is broken, is broken; it shall not stand.

ALTHAEA.

Woe, woe for him that breaketh; and a rod Smote it of old, and now the axe is here.

CHORUS.

Not as with sundering of the earth Nor as with cleaving of the sea Nor fierce foreshadowings of a birth Nor flying dreams of death to be Nor loosening of the large world's girth And quickening of the body of night, And sound of thunder in men's ears And fire of lightning in men's sight, Fate, mother of desires and fears, Bore unto men the law of tears; But sudden, an unfathered flame, And broken out of night, she shone, She, without body, without name, In days forgotten and foregone; And heaven rang round her as she came Like smitten cymbals, and lay bare, Clouds and great stars, thunders and snows, The blue sad fields and folds of air, The life that breathes, the life that grows, All wind, all fire, that burns or blows, Even all these knew her: for she is great; The daughter of doom, the mother of death, The sister of sorrow; a lifelong weight That no man's finger lighteneth, Nor any god can lighten fate, A landmark seen across the way Where one race treads as the other trod; An evil sceptre, an evil stay, Wrought for a staff, wrought for a rod, The bitter jealousy of God.

For death is deep as the sea, And fate as the waves thereof. Shall the waves take pity on thee Or the southwind offer thee love? Wilt thou take the night for thy day Or the darkness for light on thy way, Till thou say in thine heart Enough? Behold, thou art over fair, thou art over wise; The sweetness of spring in thine hair, and the light in thine eyes. The light of the spring in thine eyes, and the sound in thine ears; Yet thine heart shall wax heavy with sighs and thine eyelids with tears. Wilt thou cover thine hair with gold, and with silver thy feet? Hast thou taken the purple to fold thee, and made thy mouth sweet? Behold, when thy face is made bare, he that loved thee shall hate; Thy face shall be no more fair at the fall of thy fate. For thy life shall fall as a leaf and be shed as the rain; And the veil of thine head shall be grief: and the crown shall be pain.

ALTHAEA.

Ho, ye that wail, and ye that sing, make way Till I be come among you. Hide your tears, Ye little weepers, and your laughing lips, Ye laughers for a little; lo mine eyes That outweep heaven at rainiest, and my mouth That laughs as gods laugh at us. Fate's are we, Yet fate is ours a breathing-space; yea, mine, Fate is made mine for ever; he is my son, My bedfellow, my brother. You strong gods, Give place unto me; I am as any of you, To give life and to take life. Thou, old earth, That hast made man and unmade; thou whose mouth Looks red from the eaten fruits of thine own womb; Behold me with what lips upon what food I feed and fill my body; even with flesh Made of my body. Lo, the fire I lit I burn with fire to quench it; yea, with flame I burn up even the dust and ash thereof.

CHORUS.

Woman, what fire is this thou burnest with?

ALTHAEA.

Yea to the bone, yea to the blood and all.

CHORUS.

For this thy face and hair are as one fire.

ALTHAEA.

A tongue that licks and beats upon the dust.

CHORUS.

And in thine eyes are hollow light and heat.

ALTHAEA.

Of flame not fed with hand or frankincense.

CHORUS.

I fear thee for the trembling of thine eyes.

ALTHAEA.

Neither with love they tremble nor for fear.

CHORUS.

And thy mouth shuddering like a shot bird.

ALTHAEA.

Not as the bride's mouth when man kisses it.

CHORUS.

Nay, but what thing is this thing thou hast done?

ALTHAEA.

Look, I am silent, speak your eyes for me.

CHORUS.

I see a faint fire lightening from the hall.

ALTHAEA.

Gaze, stretch your eyes, strain till the lids drop off.

CHORUS.

Flushed pillars down the flickering vestibule.

ALTHAEA.

Stretch with your necks like birds: cry, chirp as they.

CHORUS.

And a long brand that blackens: and white dust

ALTHAEA.

O children, what is this ye see? your eyes Are blinder than night's face at fall of moon. That is my son, my flesh, my fruit of life, My travail, and the year's weight of my womb, Meleager, a fire enkindled of mine hands And of mine hands extinguished, this is he.

CHORUS.

O gods, what word has flown out at thy mouth?

ALTHAEA.

I did this and I say this and I die.

CHORUS.

Death stands upon the doorway of thy lips, And in thy mouth has death set up his house. ALTHAEA.

O death, a little, a little while, sweet death, Until I see the brand burnt down and die.

CHORUS.

She reels as any reed under the wind, And cleaves unto the ground with staggering feet.

ALTHAEA.

Girls, one thing will I say and hold my peace. I that did this will weep not nor cry out, Cry ye and weep: I will not call on gods, Call ye on them; I will not pity man, Shew ye your pity. I know not if I live; Save that I feel the fire upon my face And on my cheek the burning of a brand. Yea the smoke bites me, yea I drink the steam With nostril and with eyelid and with lip Insatiate and intolerant; and mine hands Burn, and fire feeds upon mine eyes; I reel As one made drunk with living, whence he draws Drunken delight; yet I, though mad for joy, Loathe my long living and am waxen red As with the shadow of shed blood; behold, I am kindled with the flames that fade in him, I am swollen with subsiding of his veins, I am flooded with his ebbing; my lit eyes Flame with the falling fire that leaves his lids Bloodless, my cheek is luminous with blood Because his face is ashen. Yet, O child, Son, first-born, fairest--O sweet mouth, sweet eyes, That drew my life out through my suckling breast, That shone and clove mine heart through--O soft knees Clinging, O tender treadings of soft feet, Cheeks warm with little kissings--O child, child, What have we made each other? Lo, I felt Thy weight cleave to me, a burden of beauty, O son, Thy cradled brows and loveliest loving lips, The floral hair, the little lightening eyes, And all thy goodly glory; with mine hands Delicately I fed thee, with my tongue Tenderly spake, saying, Verily in God's time, For all the little likeness of thy limbs, Son, I shall make thee a kingly man to fight, A lordly leader; and hear before I die, 'She bore the goodliest sword of all the world.' Oh! oh! For all my life turns round on me; I am severed from myself, my name is gone, My name that was a healing, it is changed, My name is a consuming. From this time, Though mine eyes reach to the end of all these things, My lips shall not unfasten till I die.

SEMICHORUS.

She has filled with sighing the city, And the ways thereof with tears; She arose, she girdled her sides, She set her face as a bride's; She wept, and she had no pity, Trembled, and felt no fears.

SEMICHORUS.

Her eyes were clear as the sun, Her brows were fresh as the day; She girdled herself with gold, Her robes were manifold; But the days of her worship are done, Her praise is taken away.

SEMICHORUS.

For she set her hand to the fire, With her mouth she kindled the same, As the mouth of a flute-player, So was the mouth of her; With the might of her strong desire She blew the breath of the flame.

SEMICHORUS.

She set her hand to the wood, She took the fire in her hand; As one who is nigh to death, She panted with strange breath; She opened her lips unto blood, She breathed and kindled the brand.

SEMICHORUS.

As a wood-dove newly shot, She sobbed and lifted her breast; She sighed and covered her eyes, Filling her lips with sighs; She sighed, she withdrew herself not, She refrained not, taking not rest;

SEMICHORUS.

But as the wind which is drouth, And as the air which is death, As storm that severeth ships, Her breath severing her lips, The breath came forth of her mouth And the fire came forth of her breath.

SECOND MESSENGER.

Queen, and you maidens, there is come on us A thing more deadly than the face of death; Meleager the good lord is as one slain.

SEMICHORUS.

Without sword, without sword is he stricken; Slain, and slain without hand.

SECOND MESSENGER.

For as keen ice divided of the sun His limbs divide, and as thawed snow the flesh Thaws from off all his body to the hair.

SEMICHORUS.

He wastes as the embers quicken; With the brand he fades as a brand SECOND MESSENGER.

Even while they sang and all drew hither and he Lifted both hands to crown the Arcadian's hair And fix the looser leaves, both hands fell down.

SEMICHORUS.

With rending of cheek and of hair Lament ye, mourn for him, weep.

SECOND MESSENGER.

Straightway the crown slid off and smote on earth, First fallen; and he, grasping his own hair, groaned And cast his raiment round his face and fell.

SEMICHORUS.

Alas for visions that were, And soothsayings spoken in sleep.

SECOND MESSENGER.

But the king twitched his reins in and leapt down And caught him, crying out twice 'O child' and thrice, So that men's eyelids thickened with their tears.

SEMICHORUS.

Lament with a long lamentation, Cry, for an end is at hand.

SECOND MESSENGER.

O son, he said, son, lift thine eyes, draw breath, Pity me; but Meleager with sharp lips Gasped, and his face waxed like as sunburnt grass.

SEMICHORUS.

Cry aloud, O thou kingdom, O nation, O stricken, a ruinous land.

SECOND MESSENGER.

Whereat king Oeneus, straightening feeble knees, With feeble hands heaved up a lessening weight, And laid him sadly in strange hands, and wept.

SEMICHORUS.

Thou art smitten, her lord, her desire, Thy dear blood wasted as rain.

SECOND MESSENGER.

And they with tears and rendings of the beard Bear hither a breathing body, wept upon And lightening at each footfall, sick to death.

SEMICHORUS.

Thou madest thy sword as a fire, With fire for a sword thou art slain.

SECOND MESSENGER.

And lo, the feast turned funeral, and the crowns Fallen; and the huntress and the hunter trapped; And weeping and changed faces and veiled hair. MELEAGER.

Let your hands meet Round the weight of my head, Lift ye my feet As the feet of the dead; For the flesh of my body is molten, the limbs of it molten as lead.

CHORUS.

O thy luminous face, Thine imperious eyes! O the grief, O the grace, As of day when it dies! Who is this bending over thee, lord, with tears and suppression of sighs?

MELEAGER.

Is a bride so fair? Is a maid so meek? With unchapleted hair, With unfilleted cheek, Atalanta, the pure among women, whose name is as blessing to speak.

ATALANTA.

I would that with feet Unsandaled, unshod, Overbold, overfleet, I had swum not nor trod From Arcadia to Calydon northward, a blast of the envy of God.

MELEAGER.

Unto each man his fate; Unto each as he saith In whose fingers the weight Of the world is as breath; Yet I would that in clamour of battle mine hands had laid hold upon death.

CHORUS.

Not with cleaving of shields And their clash in thine ear, When the lord of fought fields Breaketh spearshaft from spear, Thou art broken, our lord, thou art broken; with travail and labour and fear,

MELEAGER.

Would God he had found me Beneath fresh boughs Would God he had bound me Unawares in mine house, With light in mine eyes, and songs in my lips, and a crown on my brows!

CHORUS.

Whence art thou sent from us? Whither thy goal? How art thou rent from us, Thou that wert whole, As with severing of eyelids and eyes, as with sundering of body and soul!

MELEAGER.

My heart is within me As an ash in the fire; Whosoever hath seen me, Without lute, without lyre, Shall sing of me grievous things, even things that were ill to desire.

CHORUS.

Who shall raise thee From the house of the dead? Or what man praise thee That thy praise may be said? Alas thy beauty! alas thy body! alas thine head!

MELEAGER.

But thou, O mother, The dreamer of dreams, Wilt thou bring forth another To feel the sun's beams When I move among shadows a shadow, and wail by impassable streams?

OENEUS.

What thing wilt thou leave me Now this thing is done? A man wilt thou give me, A son for my son, For the light of mine eyes, the desire of my life, the desirable one?

CHORUS.

Thou wert glad above others, Yea, fair beyond word, Thou wert glad among mothers; For each man that heard Of thee, praise there was added unto thee, as wings to the feet of a bird.

OENEUS.

Who shall give back Thy face of old years, With travail made black, Grown grey among fears, Mother of sorrow, mother of cursing, mother of tears?

MELEAGER.

Though thou art as fire Fed with fuel in vain, My delight, my desire, Is more chaste than the rain, More pure than the dewfall, more holy than stars are that live without stain.

ATALANTA.

I would that as water My life's blood had thawn, Or as winter's wan daughter Leaves lowland and lawn Spring-stricken, or ever mine eyes had beheld thee made dark in thy dawn.

CHORUS.

When thou dravest the men Of the chosen of Thrace, None turned him again Nor endured he thy face Clothed round with the blush of the battle, with light from a terrible place.

OENEUS.

Thou shouldst die as he dies For whom none sheddeth tears; Filling thine eyes And fulfilling thine ears With the brilliance of battle, the bloom and the beauty, the splendour of spears.

CHORUS.

In the ears of the world It is sung, it is told, And the light thereof hurled And the noise thereof rolled From the Acroceraunian snow to the ford of the fleece of gold.

MELEAGER.

Would God ye could carry me Forth of all these; Heap sand and bury me By the Chersonese Where the thundering Bosphorus answers the thunder of Pontic seas.

OENEUS.

Dost thou mock at our praise And the singing begun And the men of strange days Praising my son In the folds of the hills of home, high places of Calydon?

MELEAGER.

For the dead man no home is; Ah, better to be What the flower of the foam is In fields of the sea, That the sea-waves might be as my raiment, the gulf-stream a garment for me.

CHORUS.

Who shall seek thee and bring And restore thee thy day, When the dove dipt her wing And the oars won their way Where the narrowing Symplegades whitened the straits of Propontis with spray?

MELEAGER.

Will ye crown me my tomb Or exalt me my name, Now my spirits consume, Now my flesh is a flame? Let the sea slake it once, and men speak of me sleeping to praise me or shame,

CHORUS.

Turn back now, turn thee, As who turns him to wake; Though the life in thee burn thee, Couldst thou bathe it and slake Where the sea-ridge of Helle hangs heavier, and east upon west waters break?

MELEAGER.

Would the winds blow me back Or the waves hurl me home? Ah, to touch in the track Where the pine learnt to roam Cold girdles and crowns of the sea-gods, cool blossoms of water and foam!

CHORUS.

The gods may release That they made fast; Thy soul shall have ease In thy limbs at the last; But what shall they give thee for life, sweet life that is overpast?

MELEAGER.

Not the life of men's veins, Not of flesh that conceives; But the grace that remains, The fair beauty that cleaves To the life of the rains in the grasses, the life of the dews on the leaves.

CHORUS.

Thou wert helmsman and chief, Wilt thou turn in an hour, Thy limbs to the leaf, Thy face to the flower, Thy blood to the water, thy soul to the gods who divide and devour?

MELEAGER.

The years are hungry, They wail all their days; The gods wax angry And weary of praise; And who shall bridle their lips? and who shall straiten their ways?

CHORUS.

The gods guard over us With sword and with rod; Weaving shadow to cover us, Heaping the sod, That law may fulfil herself wholly, to darken man's face before God.

MELEAGER.

O holy head of Oeneus, lo thy son Guiltless, yet red from alien guilt, yet foul With kinship of contaminated lives, Lo, for their blood I die; and mine own blood For bloodshedding of mine is mixed therewith, That death may not discern me from my kin. Yet with clean heart I die and faultless hand, Not shamefully; thou therefore of thy love Salute me, and bid fare among the dead Well, as the dead fare; for the best man dead Fares sadly; nathless I now faring well Pass without fear where nothing is to fear Having thy love about me and thy goodwill, O father, among dark places and men dead.

OENEUS.

Child, I salute thee with sad heart and tears, And bid thee comfort, being a perfect man In fight, and honourable in the house of peace. The gods give thee fair wage and dues of death, And me brief days and ways to come at thee.

MELEAGER.