Classic Poem

" P ROMETHEUS Bound . "

Prometheus [ alone on the crag ]. O holy Æther, and swift-winged Winds,
And River-wells, and Laughter innumerous
Of yon sea-waves! Earth, mother of us all,
And all-viewing cyclic Sun, I cry on you, —
Behold me a god, what I endure from gods!
Behold, with throe on throe,
How, wasted by this woe,
I wrestle down the myriad years of time!
Behold how, fast around me,
The new King of the happy ones sublime
Has flung the chain he forged, has shamed and bound me!
Woe, woe! to-day's woe and the coming morrow's
I cover with one groan. And where is found me
A limit to these sorrows?
And yet what word do I say? I have foreknown
Clearly all things that should be; nothing done
Comes sudden to my soul; and I must bear
What is ordained with patience, being aware
Necessity doth front the universe
With an invincible gesture. Yet this curse
Which strikes me now I find it hard to brave
In silence or in speech. Because I gave
Honour to mortals, I have yoked my soul
To this compelling fate. Because I stole
The secret fount of fire, whose bubbles went
Over the ferule's brim, and manward sent
Art's mighty means and perfect rudiment,
That sin I expiate in this agony,
Hung here in fetters, 'neath the blanching sky.
Ah, ah me! what a sound!
What a fragrance sweeps up from a pinion unseen
Of a god, or a mortal, or nature between,
Sweeping up to this rock where the Earth has her bound,
To have sight of my pangs, or some guerdon obtain.
Lo, a god in the anguish, a god in the chain!
The god Zeus hateth sore,
The god Zeus hateth sore,
As many as tread on his glorified floor,
Because I loved mortals too much evermore.
Alas me! what a murmur and motion I hear,
As of birds flying near!
And the air undersings
The light stroke of their wings,
And all life that approaches I wait for in fear.

Chorus of Sea-nymphs, 1st strophe.


Fear nothing! our troop
Floats lovingly up
With a quick-oaring stroke
Of wings steered to the rock,
Having softened the soul of our father below.
For the gales of swift-bearing have sent me a sound,
And the clank of the iron, the malleted blow,
Smote down the profound
Of my caverns of old,
And struck the red light in a blush from my brow,
Till I sprang up unsandalled, in haste to behold,
And rushed forth on my chariot of wings manifold.

Prometheus . Alas me! alas me!
Ye offspring of Tethys, who bore at her breast
Many children, and eke of Oceanus, he,
Coiling still around earth with perpetual unrest!
Behold me and see
How transfixed with the fang
Of a fetterhang
On the high-jutting rocks of this fissure, and keep
An uncoveted watch o'er the world and the deep.

Chorus.

I behold thee, Prometheus; yet now, yet now,
A terrible cloud whose rain is tears
Sweeps over mine eyes that witness how
Thy body appears
Hung awaste on the rocks by infrangible chains;
For new is the hand, new the rudder, that steers
The ship of Olympus through surge and wind,
And of old things past, no track is behind.

Prometheus . Under earth, under Hades,
Where the home of the shade is,
All into the deep, deep Tartarus,
I would he had hurled me adown.
I would he had plunged me, fastened thus
In the knotted chain, with the savage clang,
All into the dark, where there should be none,
Neither god nor another, to laugh and see.
But now the winds sing through and shake
The hurtling chains wherein I hang,
And I in my naked sorrows make
Much mirth for my enemy.

Chorus.

Nay! who of the gods hath a heart so stern
As to use thy woe for a mock and mirth?
Who would not turn more mild to learn
Thy sorrows? who of the heaven and earth
Save Zeus? But he
Right wrathfully
Bears on his sceptral soul unbent,
And rules thereby the heavenly seed,
Nor will he pause till he content
His thirsty heart in a finished deed,
Or till Another shall appear,
To win by fraud, to seize by fear,
The hard-to-be-captured government.
Prometheus . Yet even of me he shall have need,
That monarch of the blessed seed, —
Of me, of me who now am curst
By his fetters dire, —
To wring my secret out withal,
And learn by whom his sceptre shall
Be filched from him, as was at first
His heavenly fire.
But he never shall enchant me
With his honey-lipt persuasion;
Never, never, shall he daunt me,
With the oath and threat of passion,
Into speaking as they want me,
Till he loose this savage chain,
And accept the expiation
Of my sorrow in his pain.

Chorus.

Thou art, sooth, a brave god,
And, for all thou hast borne
From the stroke of the rod,
Naught relaxest from scorn.
But thou speakest unto me
Too free and unworn;
And a terror strikes though me
And festers my soul,
And I fear, in the roll
Of the storm, for thy fate
In the ship far from shore;
Since the son of Saturnus is hard in his hate,
And unmoved in his heart evermore.

Prometheus . I know that Zeus is stern;
I know he metes his justice by his will;
And yet his soul shall learn
More softness when once broken by this ill;
And, curbing his unconquerable vaunt,
He shall rush on in fear to meet with me
Who rush to meet with him in agony,
To issues of harmonious covenant.
Chorus . Remove the veil from all things, and relate
The story to us, — of what crime accused,
Zeus smites thee with dishonourable pangs.
Speak, if to teach us do not grieve thyself.
Prometheus . The utterance of these things is torture to me,
But so, too, is their silence: each way lies
Woe strong as fate.
When gods began with wrath,
And war rose up between their starry brows,
Some choosing to cast Chronos from his throne
That Zeus might king it there, and some in haste
With opposite oaths, that they would have no Zeus
To rule the gods forever, — I, who brought
The counsel I thought meetest, could not move
The Titans, children of the Heaven and Earth,
What time, disdaining in their rugged souls
My subtle machinations, they assumed
It was an easy thing for force to take
The mastery of fate. My mother, then,
Who is called not only Themis, but Earth too
(Her single beauty joys in many names),
Did teach me with reiterant prophecy
What future should be, and how conquering gods
Should not prevail by strength and violence,
But by guile only. When I told them so,
They would not deign to contemplate the truth
On all sides round; whereat I deemed it best
To lead my willing mother upwardly,
And set my Themis face to face with Zeus
As willing to receive her. Tartarus,
With its abysmal cloister of the Dark,
Because I gave that counsel, covers up
The antique Chronos and his siding hosts,
And, by that counsel helpt, the king of gods
Hath recompensed me with these bitter pangs;
For kingship wears a cancer at the heart, —
Distrust in friendship. Do ye also ask
What crime it is for which he tortures me?
That shall be clear before you. When at first
He filled his father's throne, he instantly
Made various gifts of glory to the gods,
And dealt the empire out. Alone of men,
Of miserable men, he took no count,
But yearned to sweep their track off from the world,
And plant a newer race there. Not a god
Resisted such desire, except myself.
I dared it! I drew mortals back to light,
From meditated ruin deep as hell!
From which wrong I am bent down in these pangs
Dreadful to suffer, mournful to behold,
And I who pitied man am thought myself
Unworthy of pity; while I render out
Deep rhythms of anguish 'neath the harping hand
That strikes me thus, — a sight to shame your Zeus!
Chorus . Hard as thy chains, and cold as all these rocks,
Is he, Prometheus, who withholds his heart
From joining in thy woe. I yearned before
To fly this sight; and, now I gaze on it,
I sicken inwards.
Prometheus . To my friends, indeed,
I must be a sad sight.
Chorus . And didst thou sin
No more than so?
Prometheus . I did restrain besides
My mortals from premeditating death.
Chorus . How didst thou medicine the plague-fear of death?
Prometheus . I set blind Hopes to inhabit in their house.
Chorus . By that gift thou didst help thy mortals well.
Prometheus . I gave them also fire.
Chorus . And have they now,
Those creatures of a day, the red-eyed fire?
Prometheus . They have, and shall learn by it many arts.
Chorus . And truly for such sins Zeus tortures thee,
And will remit no anguish? Is there set
No limit before thee to thine agony?
Prometheus . No other — only what seems good to HIM .
Chorus . And how will it seem good? what hope remains?
Seest thou not that thou hast sinned? But that thou hast sinned
It glads me not to speak of, and grieves thee;
Then let it pass from both, and seek thyself
Some outlet from distress.
Prometheus . It is in truth
An easy thing to stand aloof from pain,
And lavish exhortation and advice
On one vexed sorely by it. I have known
All in prevision. By my choice, my choice,
I freely sinned, — I will confess my sin, —
And, helping mortals, found mine own despair.
I did not think indeed that I should pine
Beneath such pangs against such skyey rocks,
Doomed to this drear hill, and no neighbouring
Of any life. But mourn not ye for griefs
I bear to-day: hear rather, dropping down
To the plain, how other woes creep on to me,
And learn the consummation of my doom.
Beseech you, nymphs, beseech you, grieve for me
Who now am grieving; for Grief walks the earth,
And sits down at the foot of each by turns.
Chorus . We hear the deep clash of thy words,
Prometheus, and obey.
And I spring with a rapid foot away
From the rushing car and the holy air,
The track of birds;
And I drop to the rugged ground, and there
Await the tale of thy despair.