The Oresteia: Agamemnon, the Libation-Bearers & the Furies (19 page)

Give me the tributes of a man
and not a god, a little earth to walk on,
not this gorgeous work.
There is no need to sound my reputation.
I have a sense of right and wrong, what’s more -
heaven’s proudest gift. Call no man blest
until he ends his life in peace, fulfilled.
If I can live by what I say, I have no fear.

 

CLYTAEMNESTRA:

One thing more. Be true to your ideals and tell me -

 

AGAMEMNON:

True to my ideals? Once I violate them I am lost.

 

CLYTAEMNESTRA:

Would you have sworn this act to god in a time of terror?

 

AGAMEMNON:

Yes, if a prophet called for a last, drastic rite.

 

CLYTAEMNESTRA:

But Priam - can you see him if he had your success?

 

AGAMEMNON:

Striding on the tapestries of god, I see him now.

 

CLYTAEMNESTRA:

And you fear the reproach of common men?

 

AGAMEMNON:

The voice of the people - aye, they have enormous power.

 

CLYTAEMNESTRA:

Perhaps, but where’s the glory without a little gall?

 

AGAMEMNON:

And where’s the woman in all this lust for glory?

 

CLYTAEMNESTRA:

But the great victor - it becomes him to give way.

 

AGAMEMNON:

Victory in this . . . war of ours, it means so much to you?

 

CLYTAEMNESTRA:

O give way! The power is yours if you surrender,
all of your own free will, to me!

 

AGAMEMNON:

Enough.
If you are so determined-

Let someone help me off with these at least.
Old slaves, they’ve stood me well.
Hurry,
and while I tread his splendours dyed red in the sea,
may no god watch and strike me down with envy
from on high. I feel such shame -
to tread the life of the house, a kingdom’s worth
of silver in the weaving.

Done is done.
Escort this stranger in, be gentle.
Conquer with compassion. Then the gods
shine down upon you, gently. No one chooses
the yoke of slavery, not of one’s free will-
and she least of all. The gift of the armies,
flower and pride of all the wealth we won,
she follows me from Troy.

 

And now,
since you have brought me down with your insistence,
just this once I enter my father’s house,
trampling royal crimson as I go.

 

CLYTAEMNESTRA:

There is the sea
and who will drain it dry? Precious as silver,
inexhaustible, ever-new, it breeds the more we reap it—
tides on tides of crimson dye our robes blood-red.
Our lives are based on wealth, my king,
the gods have seen to that.
Destitution, our house has never heard the word.
I
would have sworn to tread on legacies of robes,
at one command from an oracle, deplete the house -
suffer the worst to bring that dear life back!

 

When the root lives on, the new leaves come back,
spreading a dense shroud of shade across the house
to thwart the Dog Star’s fury. So you return
to the father’s hearth, you bring us warmth in winter
like the sun -
And you are Zeus when Zeus
tramples the bitter virgin grape for new wine
and the welcome chill steals through the halls, at last
the master moves among the shadows of his house, fulfilled.

 

Zeus, Zeus, master of all fulfilment, now fulfil our prayers—
speed our rites to their fulfilment once for all!

 

CHORUS:

Why, why does it rock me, never stops,
this terror beating down my heart,
this seer that sees it all-
it beats its wings, uncalled unpaid
thrust on the lungs
the mercenary song beats on and on
singing a prophet’s strain -
and I can’t throw it off
like dreams that make no sense,
and the strength drains
that filled the mind with trust,
and the years drift by and the driven sand
has buried the mooring lines
that churned when the armoured squadrons cut for Troy . . .
and now I believe it, I can prove he’s home,
my own clear eyes for witness—
Agamemnon
!
Still it’s chanting, beating deep so deep in the heart
this dirge of the Furies, oh dear god,
not fit for the lyre, its own master
it kills our spirit
kills our hopes
and it’s real, true, no fantasy—
stark terror whirls the brain
and the end is coming
Justice comes to birth-
I pray my fears prove false and fall
and die and never come to birth!

 

Even exultant health, well we know,
exceeds its limits, comes so near disease
it can breach the wall between them.

 

Even a man’s fate, held true on course,
in a blinding flash rams some hidden reef;
but if caution only casts the pick of the cargo -
one well-balanced cast -
the house will not go down, not outright;
labouring under its wealth of grief
the ship of state rides on.

 

Yes, and the great green bounty of god,
sown in the furrows year by year and reaped each fall
can end the plague of famine.

 

But a man’s life-blood
is dark and mortal.
Once it wets the earth
what song can sing it back?
Not even the master-healer
who brought the dead to life -
Zeus stopped the man before he did more harm.

 

Oh, if only the gods had never forged
the chain that curbs our excess,
one man’s fate curbing the next man’s fate,
my heart would outrace my song, I’d pour out all I feel -
but no, I choke with anguish,
mutter through the nights.
Never to ravel out a hope in time
and the brain is swarming, burning —

 

CLYTAEMNESTRA:

Won’t you come inside? I mean you, Cassandra.
Zeus in all his mercy wants you to share
some victory libations with the house.
The slaves are flocking. Come, lead them
up to the altar of the god who guards
our dearest treasures.
Down from the chariot,
this is no time for pride. Why even Heracles,
they say, was sold into bondage long ago,
he had to endure the bitter bread of slaves.
But if the yoke descends on you, be grateful
for a master born and reared in ancient wealth.
Those who reap a harvest past their hopes
are merciless to their slaves.
From us
you will receive what custom says is right.

 

LEADER:

It’s you she is speaking to, it’s all too clear.
You’re caught in the nets of doom — obey
if you can obey, unless you cannot bear to.

 

CLYTAEMNESTRA:

Unless she’s like a swallow, possessed
of her own barbaric song, strange, dark.
I speak directly as I can - she must obey.

 

LEADER:

Go with her. Make the best of it, she’s right.
Step down from the seat, obey her.

 

CLYTAEMNESTRA:

Do it mow -
I have no time to spend outside. Already
the victims crowd the hearth, the Navelstone,
to bless this day of joy I never hoped to see ! -
our victims waiting for the fire and die knife,
and you,
if you want to taste our mystic rites, come now.
If my words can’t reach you

—
Turning to the
LEADER.
Give her a sign,

one of her exotic handsigns.

 

LEADER:

I think
the stranger needs an interpreter, someone clear.
She’s like a wild creature, fresh caught.

 

CLYTAEMNESTRA:

She’s mad,
her evil genius murmuring in her ears.
She comes from a city fresh caught.
She must learn to take the cutting bridle
before she foams her spirit off in blood -
and that’s the last I waste on her contempt!

 

LEADER:

Not I, I pity her. I will be gentle.
Come, poor thing. Leave the empty chariot -
Of your own free will try on the yoke of Fate.

 

CASSANDRA:

Aieeeeee! Earth - Mother-
Curse of the Earth - Apollo Apollo!

 

LEADER:

Why cry to Apollo?
He’s not the god to call with sounds of mourning.

 

CASSANDRA:

Aieeeeee! Earth - Mother -
Rape of the Earth - Apollo Apollo!

 

LEADER:

Again, it’s a bad omen.
She cries for the god who wants no part of grief.

 

CASSANDRA:

God of the long road,
Apollo
Apollo
my destroyer-
you destroy me once, destroy me twice -

 

LEADER:

She’s about to sense her own ordeal, I think.
Slave that she is, the god lives on inside her.

 

CASSANDRA:

God of the iron marches,
Apollo
Apollo
my destroyer-
where, where have you led me now? what house -

 

LEADER:

The house of Atreus and his sons. Really -
don’t you know? It’s true, see for yourself.

 

CASSANDRA:

No . . . the house that hates god,
an echoing womb of guilt, kinsmen
torturing kinsmen, severed heads,
slaughterhouse of heroes, soil streaming blood -

 

LEADER:

A keen hound, this stranger.
Trailing murder, and murder she will find.

 

CASSANDRA:

See, my witnesses -
I trust to them, to the babies
wailing, skewered on the sword,
their flesh charred, the father gorging on their parts -

 

LEADER:

We’d heard your fame as a seer,
but no one looks for seers in Argos.

 

CASSANDRA:

Oh no, what horror, what new plot,
new agony this? -
it’s growing, massing, deep in the house,
a plot, a monstrous - thing
to crush the loved ones, no,
there is no cure, and rescue’s far away and -

 

LEADER:

I can’t read these signs; I knew the first,
the city rings with them.

 

CASSANDRA:

You, you godforsaken - you’d do this?
The lord of your bed,
you bathe him . . . his body glistens, then -
how to tell the climax? -
comes so quickly, see,
hand over hand shoots out, hauling ropes -
then lunge!

 

LEADER:

Still lost. Her riddles, her dark words of god -
I’m groping, helpless.

 

CASSANDRA:

No no, look
there! -
what’s that? some net flung out of hell -
No, she is the snare,
the bedmate, deathmate, murder’s strong right arm I
Let the insatiate discord in the race
rear up and shriek ‘Avenge the victim — stone them dead!’

 

LEADER:

What Fury is this? Why rouse it, lift its wailing
through the house? I hear you and lose hope.

 

CHORUS:

Drop by drop at the heart, the gold of life ebbs out.
We are the old soldiers . . . wounds will come
with the crushing sunset of our lives.
Death is close, and quick.

 

CASSANDRA:

Look out!
look out
!
—
Ai, drag the great bull from the mate! -
a thrash of robes, she traps him -
writhing-
black horn glints, twists -
she gores him through
!
And now he buckles, look, the bath swirls red-
There’s stealth and murder in the cauldron, do you hear?

 

LEADER:

I’m no judge, I’ve little skill with the oracles,
but even I know danger when I hear it.

 

CHORUS:

What good are the oracles to men? Words, more words,
and the hurt comes on us, endless words
and a seer’s techniques have brought us
terror and the truth.

 

CASSANDRA:

The agony - O I am breaking! - Fate’s so hard,
and the pain that floods my voice is mine alone.
Why have you brought me here, tormented as I am?
Why, unless to die with him, why else?

 

LEADER AND CHORUS:

Mad with the rapture - god speeds you on
to the song, the deathsong,
like the nightingale that broods on sorrow,
mourns her son, her son,
her life inspired with grief for him,
she lilts and shrills, dark bird that lives for night.

 

CASSANDRA:

The nightingale - O for a song, a fate like hers!
The gods gave her a life of ease, swathed her in wings,
no tears, no wailing. The knife waits for me.
They’ll splay me on the iron’s double edge.