Book I: Tartarus — Clytaemnestra

Then it was again
A woman whom I saw, pitiless, stern,
Bearing the brand of blood--a lithe dark form,
And cruel eyes which glared beneath the gems
That argued her a Queen, and on her side
An ancient stain of gore, which did befoul
Her royal robe. A murderess in thought
And dreadful act, who took within the toils
Her kingly Lord, and slew him of old time
After burnt Troy. I had no time to speak
When she shrieked thus:
"It doth repent me not
I would 'twere yet to do, and I would do it
Again a thousand times, if the shed blood
Might for one hour restore me to the kisses
Of my AEgisthus. Oh, he was divine,
My hero, with the godlike locks and eyes
Of Eros' self! What boots it that they prate
Of wifely duty, love of spouse or child,
Honour or pity, when the swift fire takes
A woman's heart, and burns it out, and leaps
With fierce forked tongue around it, till it lies
In ashes, a dead heart, nor aught remains
Of old affections, naught but the new flame
Which is unquenched desire?
It did not come,
My blessing, all at once, but the slow fruit
Of solitude and midnight loneliness,
And weary waiting for the tardy news
Of taken Troy. Long years I sate alone,
Widowed, within my palace, while my Lord
Was over seas, waging the accursed war,
First of the file of Kings. Year after year
Came false report, or harder, no report
Of the great fleet. The summers waxed and waned,
The wintry surges smote the sounding shores,
And yet there came no end of it. They brought
Now hopeless failure, now great victories;
And all alike were false, all but delay
And hope deferred, which cometh not, but breaks
The heart which suffering wrings not.
So I bore
Long time the solitary years, and sought
To solace the dull days with motherly cares
For those my Lord had left me. My firstborn,
Iphigeneia, sailed at first with him
Upon that fatal voyage, but the young
Orestes and Electra stayed with me--
Not dear as she was, for the firstborn takes
The mother's heart, and, with the milk it draws
From the mother's virgin breast, drains all the love
It bore, ay, even tho' the sire be dear;
Much more, then, when he is a King indeed,
Mighty in war and council, but too high
To stoop to a woman's love. But she was gone,
Nor heard I tidings of her, knowing not
If yet she walked the earth, nor if she bare
The load of children, even as I had borne
Her in my opening girlhood, when I leapt
From child to Queen, but never loved the King.

Thus the slow years rolled onward, till at last
There came a dreadful rumour--'She is dead,
Thy daughter, years ago. The cruel priests
Clamoured for blood; the stern cold Kings stood round
Without a tear, and he, her sire, with them,
To see a virgin bleed. They cut with knives
The taper girlish throat; they watched the blood
Drip slowly on the sand, and the young life
Meek as a lamb come to the sacrifice
To appease the angry gods.' And he, the King,
Her father, stood by too, and saw them do it,
The wickedness, breathing no word of wrath,
Till all was done! The cowards! the dull cowards!
I would some black storm, bursting suddenly,
Had whelmed them and their fleets, ere yet they dared
To waste an innocent life!
I had gone mad,
I know it, but for him, my love, my dear,
My fair sweet love. He came to comfort me
With words of friendship, holding that my Lord
Was bound, perhaps, to let her die--'The gods
Were ofttimes hard to appease--or was it indeed
The priests who asked it? Were there any gods?
Or only phantoms, creatures of the brain,
Born of the fears of men, the greed of priests,
Useful to govern women? Had he been
Lord of the fleet, not all the soothsayers
Who ever frighted cowards should have brought
His soul to such black depths.' I hearkening to him
As 'twere my own thought grown articulate,
Found my grief turn to hate, and hate to love--
Hate of my Lord, love of the voice which spoke
Such dear and comfortable words. And thus,
Love to a storm of passion growing, swept
My wounded soul and dried my tears, as dries
The hot sirocco all the bitter pools
Of salt among the sand. I never knew
True love before; I was a child, no more,
When the King cast his eyes on me. What is it
To have borne the weight of offspring 'neath the zone,
If Love be not their sire; or live long years
Of commerce, not of love? Better a day
Of Passion than the long unlovely years
Of wifely duty, when Love cometh not
To wake the barren days!
And yet at first
I hesitated long, nor would embrace
The blessing that was mine. We are hedged round,
We women, by such close-drawn ordinances,
Set round us by our tyrants, that we fear
To overstep a hand's breadth the dull bounds
Of custom; but at last Love, waking in me,
Burst all my chains asunder, and I lived
For naught but Love.
My son, the young Orestes,
I sent far off; my girl Electra only
Remained, too young to doubt me, and I knew
At last what 'twas to live.
So the swift years
Fleeted and found me happy, till the dark
Ill-omened day when Rumour, thousand-tongued,
Whispered of taken Troy; and from my dream
Of happiness, sudden I woke, and knew
The coming retribution. We had grown
Too loving for concealment, and our tale
Of mutual love was bruited far and wide
Through Argos. All the gossips bruited it,
And were all tongue to tell it to the King
When he should come. And should the cold proud Lord
I never loved, the murderer of my girl,
Come 'twixt my love and me? A swift resolve
Flashed through me pondering on it: Love for Love
And Blood for Blood--the simple golden rule
Taught by the elder gods.
When I had taken
My fixed resolve, I grew impatient for it,
Counting the laggard days. Oh, it was sweet
To simulate the yearning of a wife
Long parted from her Lord, and mock the fools
Who dogged each look and word, and but for fear
Had torn me from my throne--the pies, the jays,
The impotent chatterers, who thought by words
To stay me in the act! 'Twas sweet to mock them
And read distrust within their eyes, when I,
Knowing my purpose, bade them quick prepare
All fitting honours for the King, and knew
They dared not disobey--oh, 'twas enough
To wing the slow-paced hours.
But when at last
I saw his sails upon the verge, and then
The sea-worn ship, and marked his face grown old,
The body a little bent, which was so straight,
The thin gray hairs which were the raven locks
Of manhood when he went, I felt a moment
I could not do the deed. But when I saw
The beautiful sad woman come with him,
The future in her eyes, and her sad voice
Proclaimed the tale of doom, two thoughts at once
Assailed me, bidding me despatch with a blow
Him and his mistress, making sure the will
Of fate, and my revenge.
Oh, it was strange
To see all happen as we planned; as 'twere
Some drama oft rehearsed, wherein each step,
Each word, is so prepared, the poorest player
Knows his turn come to do--the solemn landing--
The ride to the palace gate--the courtesies
Of welcome--the mute crowds without--the bath
Prepared within--the precious circling folds
Of tissue stretched around him, shutting out
The gaze, and folding helpless like a net
The mighty limbs--the battle-axe laid down
Against the wall, and I, his wife and Queen,
Alone with him, waiting and watching still,
Till the woman shrieked without. Then with swift step
I seized the axe, and struck him as he lay
Helpless, once, twice, and thrice--once for my girl,
Once for my love, once for the woman, and all
For Fate and my Revenge!
He gave a groan,
Once only, as I thought he might; and then
No sound but the quick gurgling of the blood,
As it flowed from him in streams, and turned the pure
And limpid water of the bath to red--
I had not looked for that--it flowed and flowed,
And seemed to madden me to look on it,
Until my love with hands bloody as mine,
But with the woman's blood, rushed in, and eyes
Rounded with horror; and we turned to go,
And left the dead alone.
But happiness
Still mocked me, and a doubt unknown before
Came on me, and amid the silken shows
And luxury of power I seemed to see
Another answer to my riddle of life
Than that I gave myself, and it was 'murder;'
And in my people's sullen mien and eyes,
'Murder;' and in the mirror, when I looked,
'Murder' glared out, and terror lest my son
Returning, grown to manhood, should avenge
His father's blood. For somehow, as 'twould seem,
The gods, if gods there be, or the stern Fate
Which doth direct our little lives, do filch
Our happiness--though bright with Love's own ray,
There comes a cloud which veils it. Yet, indeed,
My days were happy. I repent me not;
I would wade through seas of blood to know again
Those fierce delights once more.
But my young girl
Electra, grown to woman, turned from me
Her modest maiden eyes, nor loved to set
Her kiss upon my cheek, but, all distraught
With secret care, hid her from all the pomps
And revelries which did befit her youth,
Walking alone; and often at the tomb
Of her lost sire they found her, pouring out
Libations to the dead. And evermore
I did bethink me of my son Orestes,
Who now should be a man; and yearned sometimes
To see his face, yet feared lest from his eyes
His father's soul should smite me.
So I lived
Happy and yet unquiet--a stern voice
Speaking of doom, which long time softer notes
Of careless weal, the music that doth spring
From the fair harmonies of life and love,
Would drown in their own concord. This at times
Nay, day by day, stronger and dreadfuller,
With dominant accent, marred the sounds of joy
By one prevailing discord. So at length
I came to lose the Present in the dread
Of what might come; the penalty that waits
Upon successful sin; who, having sinned,
Had missed my sin's reward.
Until one day
I, looking from my palace casement, saw
A humble suppliant, clad in pilgrim garb,
Approach the marble stair. A sudden throb
Thrilled thro' me, and the mother's heart went forth
Thro' all disguise of garb and rank and years,
Knowing my son. How fair he was, how tall
And vigorous, my boy! What strong straight limbs
And noble port! How beautiful the shade
Of manhood on his lip! I longed to burst
From my chamber down, yearning to throw myself
Upon his neck within the palace court,
Before the guards--spurning my queenly rank,
All but my motherhood. And then a chill
Of doubt o'erspread me, knowing what a gulf
Fate set between our lives, impassable
As that great gulf which yawns 'twixt life and death
And 'twixt this Hell and Heaven. I shrank back,
And turned to think a moment, half in fear,
And half in pain; dividing the swift mind,
Yet all in love.
Then came a cry, a groan,
From the inner court, the clash of swords, the fall
Of a body on the pavement; and one cried,
'The King is dead, slain by the young Orestes,
Who cometh hither.' With the word, the door
Flew open, and my son stood straight before me,
His drawn sword dripping blood. Oh, he was fair
And terrible to see, when from his limbs,
The suppliant's mantle fallen, left the mail
And arms of a young warrior. Love and Hate,
Which are the offspring of a common sire,
Strove for the mastery, till within his eyes
I saw his father's ghost glare unappeased
From out Love's casements.
Then I knew my fate
And his--mine to be slain by my son's hand,
And his to slay me, since the Furies drave
Our lives to one destruction; and I took
His point within my breast.
But I praise not
The selfish, careless gods who wrecked our lives,
Making the King the murderer of his girl,
And me his murderess; making my son
The murderer of his mother and her love--
A mystery of blood!--I curse them all,
The careless Forces, sitting far withdrawn
Upon the heights of Space, taking men's lives
For playthings, and deriding as in sport
Our happiness and woe--I curse them all.
We have a right to joy; we have a right,
I say, as they have. Let them stand confessed
The puppets that they are--too weak to give
The good they feign to love, since Fate, too strong
For them as us, beyond their painted sky,
Sits and derides them, too. I curse Fate too,
The deaf blind Fury, taking human souls
And crushing them, as a dull fretful child
Crushes its toys and knows not with what skill
Those feeble forms are feigned.
I curse, I loathe,
I spit on them. It doth repent me not.
I would 'twere yet to do. I have lived my life.
I have loved. See, there he lies within the bath,
And thus I smite him! thus! Didst hear him groan?
Oh, vengeance, thou art sweet! What, living still?
Ah me! we cannot die! Come, torture me,
Ye Furies--for I love not soothing words--
As once ye did my son. Ye miserable
Blind ministers of Hell, I do defy you;
Not all your torments can undo the Past
Of Passion and of Love!"

Even as she spake
There came a viewless trouble in the air,
Which took her, and a sweep of wings unseen,
And terrible sounds, which swooped on her and hushed
Her voice, and seemed to occupy her soul
With horror and despair; and as she passed
I marked her agonized eyes.

But as I went,
Full many a dreadful shape of lonely pain
I saw. What need to tell them? We are filled
Who live to-day with a more present sense
Of the great love of God, than those of old
Who, groping in the dawn of Knowledge, saw
Only dark shadows of the Unknown; or he,
First-born of modern singers, who swept deep
His awful lyre, and woke the voice of song,
Dumb for long centuries of pain. We dread
To dwell on those long agonies its sin
Brings on the offending soul; who hold a creed
Of deeper Pity, knowing what chains of ill
Bind round our petty lives. Each phase of woe,
Suffering, and torture which the gloomy thought
Of bigots feigns for others--all were there.
One there was stretched upon a rolling wheel,
Which was the barren round of sense, that still
Returned upon itself and broke the limbs
Bound to it day and night. Others I saw
Doomed, with unceasing toil, to fill the urns
Whose precious waters sank ere they could slake
Their burning thirst. Another shapeless soul,
Full of revolts and hates and tyrannous force,
The weight of earth, which was its earth-born taint,
Pressed groaning down, while with fierce beak and claw
The vulture of remorse, piercing his breast,
Preyed on his heart. For others, overhead,
Great crags of rock impending seemed to fall,
But fell not nor brought peace. I felt my soul
Blunted with horrors, yearning to escape
To where, upon the limits of the wood,
Some scanty twilight grew.
But ere I passed
From those grim shades a deep voice sounded near,
A voice without a form.
"There is an end
Of all things that thou seest! There is an end
Of Wrong and Death and Hell! When the long wear
Of Time and Suffering has effaced the stain
Ingrown upon the soul, and the cleansed spirit,
Long ages floating on the wandering winds
Or rolling deeps of Space, renews itself
And doth regain its dwelling, and, once more
Blent with the general order, floats anew
Upon the stream of Things, and comes at length,
After new deaths, to that dim waiting-place
Thou next shalt see, and with the justified
White souls awaits the End; or, snatched at once,
If Fate so will, to the pure sphere itself,
Lives and is blest, and works the Eternal Work
Whose name and end is Love! There is an end
Of Wrong and Death and Hell!"
Even as I heard,
I passed from out the shadow of Death and Pain,
Crying, "There is an end!"