The Oresteia: Agamemnon, the Libation-Bearers & the Furies (24 page)

 

ORESTES:

Sweet Earth, how long? - great lords of death, look on,
you mighty curses of the dead. Look on
the last of Atreus’ children, here, the remnant
helpless, cast from home . . . god, where to turn?

 

LEADER:

And again my pulses race and leap,
I can feel your sobs, and hope
becomes despair
and the heart goes dark to hear you -
then the anguish ebbs, I see you stronger,
hope and the light come on me.

 

ELECTRA:

What
hope? - what force to summon, what can help?
What but the pain we suffer, bred by her?
So let her fawn. She can never soothe her young wolves-
Mother dear, you bred our wolves’ raw fury.

 

LEADER AND CHORUS:

I beat and beat the dirge like a Persian mourner,
hands clenched tight and the blows are coming thick and fast,
you can see the hands shoot out,
now hand over hand and down - the head pulsates,
blood at the temples pounding to explode !

 

ELECTRA:

Reckless, brutal mother - oh dear god ! -
The brutal, cruel cortège,
the warlord stripped of his honour guard
and stripped of mourning rites -
you dared entomb your lord unwept, unsung.

 

ORESTES:

Shamed for all the world, you mean -
dear god, my father degraded so!
Oh she’ll pay,
she’ll pay, by the gods and these bare hands -
just let me take her life and
die
!

 

LEADER AND CHORUS:

Shamed?
Butchered,
I tell you - hands lopped,
strung to shackle his neck and arms!
So she worked,
she buried him, made your life a hell.
Your father mutilated - do you hear?

 

ELECTRA:

You tell him of father’s death, but I was an outcast,
worthless, leashed like a vicious dog in a dark cell.
I wept - laughter died that day . . .
I wept, pouring out the tears behind my veils.
Hear
that,
my brother, carve it on your heart !

 

LEADER AND CHORUS:

Let it ring in your ears
but let your heart stand firm.
The outrage stands as it stands,
you burn to know the end,
but first be strong, be steel, then down and fight.

 

ORESTES:

I am calling you, my father — be with all you love !

 

ELECTRA:

I am with you, calling through my tears.

 

LEADER AND CHORUS:

We band together now, the call resounds-
hear us now, come back into the light.
Be with us, battle all you hate.

 

ORESTES:

Now force
clash
with force — right with right !

 

ELECTRA:

Dear gods, be just - win back our rights.

 

LEADER AND CHORUS:

The flesh crawls to hear them pray.
The hour of doom has waited long . . .
pray for it once, and oh my god, it comes.

 

CHORUS:

Oh, the torment bred in the race,
the grinding scream of death
and the stroke that hits the vein,
the haemorrhage none can staunch, the grief,
the curse no man can bear.

 

But there is a cure in the house
and not outside it, no,
not from others but from them,
their bloody strife. We sing to you,
dark gods beneath the earth.

 

Now hear, you blissful powers underground -
answer the call, send help.
Bless the children, give them triumph now.

 

ORESTES:

Father, king, no royal death you died -
give me the power now to rule our house.

 

ELECTRA:

I need you too, my father.
Help me kill her lover, then go free.

 

ORESTES:

Then men will extend the sacred feast to you.
Or else, when the steam and the rich savour bum
for Mother Earth, you will starve for honour.

 

ELECTRA:

And I will pour my birthright out to you -
the wine of the fathers’ house, my bridal wine,
and first of all the shrines revere your tomb.

 

ORESTES:

O Earth, bring father up to watch me fight.

 

ELECTRA:

O Persephone, give us power - lovely, gorgeous power!

 

ORESTES:

Remember the bath - they stripped away your life, my father.

 

ELECTRA:

Remember the all-embracing net - they made it first for you.

 

ORESTES:

Chained like a beast - chains of hate, not bronze, my father !

 

ELECTRA:

Shamed in the schemes, the hoods they slung around you!

 

ORESTES:

Does our taunting wake you, oh my father?

 

ELECTRA:

Do you lift your beloved head?

 

ORESTES:

Send us justice, fight for all you love,
or help us pin them grip for grip. They threw you-
don’t you long to throw them down in turn?

 

ELECTRA:

One last cry, father. Look at your nestlings
stationed at your tomb - pity
your son and daughter. We are all you have.

 

ORESTES:

Never blot out the seed of Pelops here.
Then in the face of death you cannot die.

 

LEADER:

The voices of children - salvation to the dead!
Corks to the net, they rescue the linen meshes
from the depths. This line will never drown!

 

ELECTRA:

Hear us - the long wail we raise is all for you!
Honour our call and you will save yourself.

 

LEADER:

And a fine thing it is to lengthen out the dirge;
you adore a grave and fate they never mourned
But now for action - now you’re set on action,
put your stars to proof.

 

ORESTES:

So we will.
One thing first, I think it’s on the track.
Why did she send libations? What possessed her,
so late, so salve a wound past healing?
To the unforgiving dead she sends this sop,
this . . . who am I to appreciate her gifts?
They fall so short of all her failings. True,
‘pour out your all to atone an act of blood,
you work for nothing’. So the saying goes.
I’m ready. Tell me what you know.

 

LEADER:

I know, my boy,
I was there. She had bad dreams. Some terror
came groping through the night, it shook her,
and she sent these cups, unholy woman.

 

ORESTES:

And you know the dream, you can tell it clearly?

 

LEADER:

She dreamed she bore a snake, said so herself and . . .

 

ORESTES:

Come to the point - where does the story end?

 

LEADER:

... she swaddled it like a baby, laid it to rest.

 

ORESTES:

And food, what did the little monster want?

 

LEADER:

She gave it her breast to suck—she was dreaming.

 

ORESTES:

And didn’t it tear her nipple, the brute inhuman-

 

LEADER :

Blood curdled the milk with each sharp tug ...

 

ORESTES:

No empty dream. The vision of a man.

 

LEADER:

. . . and she woke with a scream, appalled,
and rows of torches, burning out of the blind dark,
flared across the halls to soothe the queen,
and then she sent the libations for the dead,
an easy cure she hopes will cut the pain.

 

ORESTES:

No,
I pray to the Earth and father’s grave to bring
that dream to life in me. I’ll play the seer -
it all fits together, watch!
If the serpent came from the same place as I,
and slept in the bands that swaddled me, and its jaws
spread wide for the breast that nursed me into life
and clots stained the milk, mother’s milk,
and she cried in fear and agony - so be it.
As she bred this sign, this violent prodigy
so she dies by violence. I turn serpent,
I kill her. So the vision says.

 

LEADER:

You are the seer for me, I like your reading.
Let it come! But now rehearse your friends.
Say do this, or don’t do that -

 

ORESTES:

The plan is simple. My sister goes inside.
And I’d have her keep the bond with me a secret.
They killed an honoured man by cunning, so
they die by cunning, caught in the same noose.
So he commands,
Apollo the Seer who’s never lied before.

 

And I like a stranger, equipped for all events,
go to the outer gates with this man here,
Pylades, a friend, the house’s friend-in-arms.
And we both will speak Parnassian, both try
for the native tones of Delphi.

 

Now, say none
at the doors will give us a royal welcome
(after all the house is ridden by a curse),
well then we wait . . . till a passer-by will stop
and puzzle and make insinuations at the house,
‘Aegisthus shuts his door on the man who needs him.
Why, I wonder - does he know? Is he home?’

 

But once through the gates, across the threshold,
once I find that man on my father’s throne,
or returning late to meet me face to face,
and his eyes shift and fall-
I promise you,
before he can ask me, Stranger, who are you?’ -
I drop him dead, a thrust of the sword, and twist!
Our Fury never wants for blood. His she drinks unmixed,
our third libation poured to Saving Zeus.

Keep a close watch inside, dear, be careful.
We must work together step by step.

And you,
better hold your tongues, religiously.
Silence, friends, or speak when it will help.

For the rest, watch over me, I need you -
guide my sword through struggle, guide me home!

 

CHORUS:

Marvels, the Earth breeds many marvels,
terrible marvels overwhelm us.
The heaving arms of the sea embrace and swarm
with savage life. And high in the no man’s land of night
torches hang like swords. The hawk on the wing,
the beast astride the fields
can tell of the whirlwind’s fury roaring strong.

 

Oh but a man’s high daring spirit,
who can account for that? Or woman’s
desperate passion daring past all bounds?
She couples with every form of ruin known to mortals.
Woman, frenzied, driven wild with lust,
twists the dark, warm harness
of wedded love - tortures man and beast!

 

Well you know, you with a sense of truth
recall Althaia,
the heartless mother
who killed her son,
ai! what a scheme she had -
she rushed his destiny,
lit the bloody torch
preserved from the day he left her loins with a cry-
the life of the torch paced his,
burning on till Fate burned out his life.

 

There is one more in the tales of hate:
remember Scylla,
the girl of slaughter
seduced by foes
to take her father’s life.
The gift of Minos,
a choker forged in gold
turned her head and Nisos’ immortal lock she cut
as he slept away his breath . . .
ruthless bitch, now Hermes takes her down.

 

Now that I call to mind old wounds that never heal -
Stop, it’s time for the wedded love-in-hate,
for the curse of the halls,
the woman’s brazen cunning
bent on her lord in arms,
her warlord’s power-
Do you respect such things?
I prize the hearthstone warmed by faith,
a woman’s temper nothing bends to outrage.

 

First at the head of legendary crime stands Lemnos.
People shudder and moan, and can’t forget-
each new horror that comes
we call the hells of Lemnos.
Loathed by the gods for guilt,
cast off by men, disgraced, their line dies out.
Who could respect what god detests?
What of these tales have I not picked with justice?

 

The sword’s at the lungs ! - it stabs deep,
the edge cuts through and through
and Justice drives it - Outrage still lives on,
not trodden to pieces underfoot, not yet,
though the laws lie trampled down,
the majesty of Zeus.

 

The anvil of Justice stands fast
and Fate beats out her sword.
Tempered for glory, a child will wipe clean
the inveterate stain of blood shed long ago -
Fury brings him home at last,
the brooding mother Fury !

 

ORESTES:

Slave, the slave! -
where is he? Hear me pounding the gates?
Is there a man inside the house?
For the third time, come out of the halls!
If Aegisthus has them welcome friendly guests.

 

PORTER:

All right, I hear you . . .
Where do you come from, stranger? Who are you?

 

ORESTES:

Announce me to the masters of the house.
I’ve come for them, I bring them news.
Hurry,
the chariot of the night is rushing on the dark !
The hour falls, the traveller casts his anchor
in an inn where every stranger feels at home.
Come out!
Whoever rules the house. The woman in charge.
No, the man, better that way.
No scruples then. Say what you mean,
man to man launch in and prove your point,
make it clear, strong.