Page 111
OEDIPUS
1170 What! she, she gave it thee?
HERDSMAN
'Tis so, my king.
OEDIPUS
1171 With what intent?
HERDSMAN
To make away with it.
OEDIPUS
1172 What, she its mother.
HERDSMAN
Fearing a dread weird.
OEDIPUS
1173 What weird?
HERDSMAN
'Twas told that he should slay his sire.
OEDIPUS
1174 What didst thou give it then to this old man?
HERDSMAN
1175 Through pity, master, for the babe. I thought
1176 He'd take it to the country whence he came;
1177 But he preserved it for the worst of woes.
1178 For if thou art in sooth what this man saith,
1179 God pity thee! thou wast to misery born.
OEDIPUS
1180 Ah me! ah me! all brought to pass, all true!
1181 O light, may I behold thee nevermore!
1182 I stand a wretch, in birth, in wedlock cursed,
1183 A parricide, incestuously, triply cursed!
1184 Exit OEDIPUS
Page 113
CHORUS
1185 Races of mortal man
1186 Whose life is but a span,
1187 I count ye but the shadow of a shade!
1188 For he who most doth know
1189 Of bliss, hath but the show;
1190 A moment, and the visions pale and fade.
1191 Thy fall, O Oedipus, thy piteous fall
1192 Warns me none born of women blest to call.
1193 For he of marksmen best,
1194 O Zeus, outshot the rest,
1195 And won the prize supreme of wealth and power.
1196 By him the vulture maid
1197 Was quelled, her witchery laid;
1198 He rose our savior and the land's strong tower.
1199 We hailed thee king and from that day adored
1200 Of mighty Thebes the universal lord.
1201 O heavy hand of fate!
1202 Who now more desolate,
1203 Whose tale more sad than thine, whose lot more dire?
1204 O Oedipus, discrowned head,
1205 Thy cradle was thy marriage bed;
1206 One harborage sufficed for son and sire.
1207 How could the soil thy father eared so long
1208 Endure to bear in silence such a wrong?
Page 115
1209 All-seeing Time hath caught
1210 Guilt, and to justice brought
1211 The son and sire commingled in one bed.
1212 O child of Laius' ill-starred race
1213 Would I had ne'er beheld thy face;
1214 I raise for thee a dirge as o'er the dead.
1215 Yet, sooth to say, through thee I drew new breath,
1216 And now through thee I feel a second death.
1217 Enter SECOND MESSENGER.
SECOND MESSENGER
1218 Most grave and reverend senators of Thebes,
1219 What Deeds ye soon must hear, what sights behold
1220 How will ye mourn, if, true-born patriots,
1221 Ye reverence still the race of Labdacus!
1222 Not Ister nor all Phasis' flood, I ween,
1223 Could wash away the blood-stains from this house,
1224 The ills it shrouds or soon will bring to light,
1225 Ills wrought of malice, not unwittingly.
1226 The worst to bear are self-inflicted wounds.
CHORUS
1227 Grievous enough for all our tears and groans
1228 Our past calamities; what canst thou add?
SECOND MESSENGER
1229 My tale is quickly told and quickly heard.
1230 Our sovereign lady queen Jocasta's dead.
CHORUS
1231 Alas, poor queen! how came she by her death?
Page 117
SECOND MESSENGER
1232 By her own hand. And all the horror of it,
1233 Not having seen, yet cannot comprehend.
1234 Nathless, as far as my poor memory serves,
1235 I will relate the unhappy lady's woe.
1236 When in her frenzy she had passed inside
1237 The vestibule, she hurried straight to win
1238 The bridal-chamber, clutching at her hair
1239 With both her hands, and, once within the room,
1240 She shut the doors behind her with a crash.
1241 "Laius," she cried, and called her husband dead
1242 Long, long ago; her thought was of that child
1243 By him begot, the son by whom the sire
1244 Was murdered and the mother left to breed
1245 With her own seed, a monstrous progeny.
1246 Then she bewailed the marriage bed whereon
1247 Poor wretch, she had conceived a double brood,
1248 Husband by husband, children by her child.
1249 What happened after that I cannot tell,
1250 Nor how the end befell, for with a shriek
1251 Burst on us Oedipus; all eyes were fixed
1252 On Oedipus, as up and down he strode,
1253 Nor could we mark her agony to the end.
1254 For stalking to and fro "A sword!" he cried,
1255 "Where is the wife, no wife, the teeming womb
1256 That bore a double harvest, me and mine?"
1257 And in his frenzy some supernal power
1258 (No mortal, surely, none of us who watched him)
1259 Guided his footsteps; with a terrible shriek,
1260 As though one beckoned him, he crashed against
1261 The folding doors, and from their staples forced
1262 The wrenched bolts and hurled himself within.
1263 Then we beheld the woman hanging there,
1264 A running noose entwined about her neck.
Page 119
1265 But when he saw her, with a maddened roar
1266 He loosed the cord; and when her wretched corpse
1267 Lay stretched on earth, what followed--O 'twas dread!
1268 He tore the golden brooches that upheld
1269 Her queenly robes, upraised them high and smote
1270 Full on his eye-balls, uttering words like these:
1271 "No more shall ye behold such sights of woe,
1272 Deeds I have suffered and myself have wrought;
1273 Henceforward quenched in darkness shall ye see
1274 Those ye should ne'er have seen; now blind to those
1275 Whom, when I saw, I vainly yearned to know."
1276 Such was the burden of his moan, whereto,
1277 Not once but oft, he struck with his hand uplift
1278 His eyes, and at each stroke the ensanguined orbs
1279 Bedewed his beard, not oozing drop by drop,
1280 But one black gory downpour, thick as hail.
1281 Such evils, issuing from the double source,
1282 Have whelmed them both, confounding man and wife.
1283 Till now the storied fortune of this house
1284 Was fortunate indeed; but from this day
1285 Woe, lamentation, ruin, death, disgrace,
1286 All ills that can be named, all, all are theirs.
CHORUS
1287 But hath he still no respite from his pain?
SECOND MESSENGER
1288 He cries, "Unbar the doors and let all Thebes
1289 Behold the slayer of his sire, his mother's--"
1290 That shameful word my lips may not repeat.
1291 He vows to fly self-banished from the land,
1292 Nor stay to bring upon his house the curse
1293 Himself had uttered; but he has no strength
Page 121
1294 Nor one to guide him, and his torture's more
1295 Than man can suffer, as yourselves will see.
1296 For lo, the palace portals are unbarred,
1297 And soon ye shall behold a sight so sad
1298 That he who must abhorred would pity it.
1299 Enter OEDIPUS blinded.
CHORUS
1300 Woeful sight! more woeful none
1301 These sad eyes have looked upon.
1302 Whence this madness? None can tell
1303 Who did cast on thee his spell,
1304 prowling all thy life around,
1305 Leaping with a demon bound.
1306 Hapless wretch! how can I brook
1307 On thy misery to look?
1308 Though to gaze on thee I yearn,
1309 Much to question, much to learn,
1310 Horror-struck away I turn.
OEDIPUS
1311 Ah me! ah woe is me!
1312 Ah whither am I borne!
1313 How like a ghost forlorn
1314 My voice flits from me on the air!
1315 On, on the demon goads. The end, ah where?
CHORUS
1316 An end too dread to tell, too dark to see.
OEDIPUS
1317 Dark, dark! The horror of darkness, like a shroud,
1318 Wraps me and bears me on through mist and cloud.
Page 123
1319 Ah me, ah me! What spasms athwart me shoot,
1320 What pangs of agonizing memory?
CHORUS
1321 No marvel if in such a plight thou feel'st
1322 The double weight of past and present woes.
OEDIPUS
1323 Ah friend, still loyal, constant still and kind,
1324 Thou carest for the blind.
1325 I know thee near, and though bereft of eyes,
1326 Thy voice I recognize.
CHORUS
1327 O doer of dread deeds, how couldst thou mar
1328 Thy vision thus? What demon goaded thee?
OEDIPUS
1329 Apollo, friend, Apollo, he it was
1330 That brought these ills to pass;
1331 But the right hand that dealt the blow
1332 Was mine, none other. How,
1333 How, could I longer see when sight
1334 Brought no delight?
CHORUS
1335 Alas! 'tis as thou sayest.
OEDIPUS
1336 Say, friends, can any look or voice
1337 Or touch of love henceforth my heart rejoice?
1338 Haste, friends, no fond delay,
1339 Take the twice cursed away
1340 Far from all ken,
1341 The man abhorred of gods, accursed of men.
Page 125
CHORUS
1342 O thy despair well suits thy desperate case.
1343 Would I had never looked upon thy face!
OEDIPUS
1344 My curse on him whoe'er unrived
1345 The waif's fell fetters and my life revived!
1346 He meant me well, yet had he left me there,
1347 He had saved my friends and me a world of care.
CHORUS
1348 I too had wished it so.
OEDIPUS
1349 Then had I never come to shed
1350 My father's blood nor climbed my mother's bed;
1351 The monstrous offspring of a womb defiled,
1352 Co-mate of him who gendered me, and child.
1353 Was ever man before afflicted thus,
1354 Like Oedipus.
CHORUS
1355 I cannot say that thou hast counseled well,
1356 For thou wert better dead than living blind.
OEDIPUS
1357 What's done was well done. Thou canst never shake
1358 My firm belief. A truce to argument.
1359 For, had I sight, I know not with what eyes
1360 I could have met my father in the shades,
1361 Or my poor mother, since against the twain
1362 I sinned, a sin no gallows could atone.
1363 Aye, but, ye say, the sight of children joys
Page 127
1364 A parent's eyes. What, born as mine were born?
1365 No, such a sight could never bring me joy;
1366 Nor this fair city with its battlements,
1367 Its temples and the statues of its gods,
1368 Sights from which I, now wretchedst of all,
1369 Once ranked the foremost Theban in all Thebes,
1370 By my own sentence am cut off, condemned
1371 By my own proclamation 'gainst the wretch,
1372 The miscreant by heaven itself declared
1373 Unclean--and of the race of Laius.
1374 Thus branded as a felon by myself,
1375 How had I dared to look you in the face?
1376 Nay, had I known a way to choke the springs
1377 Of hearing, I had never shrunk to make
1378 A dungeon of this miserable frame,
1379 Cut off from sight and hearing; for 'tis bliss
1380 to bide in regions sorrow cannot reach.
1381 Why didst thou harbor me, Cithaeron, why
1382 Didst thou not take and slay me? Then I never
1383 Had shown to men the secret of my birth.
1384 O Polybus, O Corinth, O my home,
1385 Home of my ancestors (so wast thou called)
1386 How fair a nursling then I seemed, how foul
1387 The canker that lay festering in the bud!
1388 Now is the blight revealed of root and fruit.
1389 Ye triple high-roads, and thou hidden glen,
1390 Coppice, and pass where meet the three-branched ways,
1391 Ye drank my blood, the life-blood these hands spilt,
1392 My father's; do ye call to mind perchance
1393 Those deeds of mine ye witnessed and the work
1394 I wrought thereafter when I came to Thebes?
1395 O fatal wedlock, thou didst give me birth,
Page 129
1396 And, having borne me, sowed again my seed,
1397 Mingling the blood of fathers, brothers, children,
1398 Brides, wives and mothers, an incestuous brood,
1399 All horrors that are wrought beneath the sun,
1400 Horrors so foul to name them were unmeet.
1401 O, I adjure you, hide me anywhere
1402 Far from this land, or slay me straight, or cast me
1403 Down to the depths of ocean out of sight.
1404 Come hither, deign to touch an abject wretch;
1405 Draw near and fear not; I myself must bear
1406 The load of guilt that none but I can share.
1407 Enter CREON.
CREON
1408 Lo, here is Creon, the one man to grant
1409 Thy prayer by action or advice, for he
1410 Is left the State's sole guardian in thy stead.
OEDIPUS
1411 Ah me! what words to accost him can I find?
1412 What cause has he to trust me? In the past
1413 I have bee proved his rancorous enemy.
CREON
1414 Not in derision, Oedipus, I come
1415 Nor to upbraid thee with thy past misdeeds.
1416 (To BYSTANDERS)
1417 But shame upon you! if ye feel no sense
1418 Of human decencies, at least revere
1419 The Sun whose light beholds and nurtures all.
1420 Leave not thus nakedly for all to gaze at
1421 A horror neither earth nor rain from heaven
1422 Nor light will suffer. Lead him straight within,
1423 For it is seemly that a kinsman's woes
1424 Be heard by kin and seen by kin alone.
Page 131
OEDIPUS
1425 O listen, since thy presence comes to me
1426 A shock of glad surprise--so noble thou,
1427 And I so vile--O grant me one small boon.
1428 I ask it not on my behalf, but thine.
CREON
1429 And what the favor thou wouldst crave of me?
OEDIPUS
1430 Forth from thy borders thrust me with all speed;
1431 Set me within some vasty desert where
1432 No mortal voice shall greet me any more.
CREON
1433 This had I done already, but I deemed
1434 It first behooved me to consult the god.
OEDIPUS
1435 His will was set forth fully--to destroy
1436 The parricide, the scoundrel; and I am he.
CREON
1437 Yea, so he spake, but in our present plight
1438 'Twere better to consult the god anew.
OEDIPUS
1439 Dare ye inquire concerning such a wretch?
CREON
1440 Yea, for thyself wouldst credit now his word.
OEDIPUS
1441 Aye, and on thee in all humility
1442 I lay this charge: let her who lies within
1443 Receive such burial as thou shalt ordain;
1444 Such rites 'tis thine, as brother, to perform.
1445 But for myself, O never let my Thebes,
1446 The city of my sires, be doomed to bear
1447 The burden of my presence while I live.
Page 133
1448 No, let me be a dweller on the hills,
1449 On yonder mount Cithaeron, famed as mine,
1450 My tomb predestined for me by my sire
1451 And mother, while they lived, that I may die
1452 Slain as they sought to slay me, when alive.
1453 This much I know full surely, nor disease
1454 Shall end my days, nor any common chance;
1455 For I had ne'er been snatched from death, unless
1456 I was predestined to some awful doom.
1457 So be it. I reck not how Fate deals with me
1458 But my unhappy children--for my sons
1459 Be not concerned, O Creon, they are men,
1460 And for themselves, where'er they be, can fend.
1461 But for my daughters twain, poor innocent maids,
1462 Who ever sat beside me at the board
1463 Sharing my viands, drinking of my cup,
1464 For them, I pray thee, care, and, if thou willst,
1465 O might I feel their touch and make my moan.
1466 Hear me, O prince, my noble-hearted prince!
1467 Could I but blindly touch them with my hands
1468 I'd think they still were mine, as when I saw.
1469 ANTIGONE and ISMENE are led in.
1470 What say I? can it be my pretty ones
1471 Whose sobs I hear? Has Creon pitied me
1472 And sent me my two darlings? Can this be?
CREON
1473 'Tis true; 'twas I procured thee this delight,
1474 Knowing the joy they were to thee of old.
OEDIPUS
1475 God speed thee! and as meed for bringing them
1476 May Providence deal with thee kindlier
1477 Than it has dealt with me! O children mine,
1478 Where are ye? Let me clasp you with these hands,
1479 A brother's hands, a father's; hands that made
Page 135
1480 Lack-luster sockets of his once bright eyes;
1481 Hands of a man who blindly, recklessly,
1482 Became your sire by her from whom he sprang.
1483 Though I cannot behold you, I must weep
1484 In thinking of the evil days to come,
1485 The slights and wrongs that men will put upon you.
1486 Where'er ye go to feast or festival,
1487 No merrymaking will it prove for you,
1488 But oft abashed in tears ye will return.
1489 And when ye come to marriageable years,
1490 Where's the bold wooers who will jeopardize
1491 To take unto himself such disrepute
1492 As to my children's children still must cling,
1493 For what of infamy is lacking here?
1494 "Their father slew his father, sowed the seed
1495 Where he himself was gendered, and begat
1496 These maidens at the source wherefrom he sprang."
1497 Such are the gibes that men will cast at you.
1498 Who then will wed you? None, I ween, but ye
1499 Must pine, poor maids, in single barrenness.
1500 O Prince, Menoeceus' son, to thee, I turn,
1501 With the it rests to father them, for we
1502 Their natural parents, both of us, are lost.
1503 O leave them not to wander poor, unwed,
1504 Thy kin, nor let them share my low estate.
1505 O pity them so young, and but for thee
1506 All destitute. Thy hand upon it, Prince.
1507 To you, my children I had much to say,
Page 137
1508 Were ye but ripe to hear. Let this suffice:
1509 Pray ye may find some home and live content,
1510 And may your lot prove happier than your sire's.
CREON
1511 Thou hast had enough of weeping; pass within.
OEDIPUS
I must obey,
1512 Though 'tis grievous.
CREON
Weep not, everything must have its day.
OEDIPUS
1513 Well I go, but on conditions.
CREON
What thy terms for going, say.
OEDIPUS
1514 Send me from the land an exile.
CREON
Ask this of the gods, not me.
OEDIPUS
1515 But I am the gods' abhorrence.
CREON
Then they soon will grant thy plea.
OEDIPUS
1516 Lead me hence, then, I am willing.
CREON
Come, but let thy children go.
Page 139
OEDIPUS
1517 Rob me not of these my children!
CREON
Crave not mastery in all,
1518 For the mastery that raised thee was thy bane and wrought thy fall.
CHORUS
1519 Look ye, countrymen and Thebans, this is Oedipus the great,
1520 He who knew the Sphinx's riddle and was mightiest in our state.
1521 Who of all our townsmen gazed not on his fame with envious eyes?
1522 Now, in what a sea of troubles sunk and overwhelmed he lies!
1523 Therefore wait to see life's ending ere thou count one mortal blest;
1524 Wait till free from pain and sorrow he has gained his final rest.
END
