Electra

Holy Light, with Earth, and Sky, Whom thou fillest equally, An how many a note of woe, Many a self-inflicted blow On my scarred breast might'st thou mark, Ever as recedes the dark; Known, too, all my nightlong cheer To bitter bed and chamber drear, How I mourn my father lost, Whom on no barbarian coast Did red Ares greet amain, But as woodmen cleave an oak My mother's axe dealt murderous stroke, Backed by the partner of her bed, Fell AE gisthus, on his head; Whence no pity, save from me, O my father, flows for thee, So falsely, foully slain. Yet I will not cease from sighing, Cease to pour my bitter crying, While I see this light of day, Or the stars' resplendent play, Uttering forth a sound of wail, Like the child-slayer, the nightingale, Here before my father's door Crying to all men evermore. O Furies dark, of birth divine! O Hades wide, and Proserpine! Thou nether Hermes! Ara great! Ye who regard the untimely dead, The dupes of an adulterous bed, Come ye, help me, and require The foul murder of our sire; And send my brother back again; Else I may no more sustain Grief's overmastering weight. Credits: Reprinted from Dramas. Sophocles. London: J.M. Dent & Sons, 1906.

3 minutes