Sophocles - Antigone (Scene 4 & Ode 4) lyrics

**SCENE IV** CHORAGOS: [*As ANTIGONE enters guarded.*] But I can no longer stand in awe of this, Nor, seeing what I see, keep back my tears. Here is Antigone, pa**ing to that chamber Where all find sleep at last 660 ANTIGONE: Look upon me, friends, and pity me Turning back at the night's edge to say Good-by to the sun that shines for me no longer; Now sleepy d**h Summons me down to Acheron, That cold shore: There is no bridesong there, nor any music. CHORUS: Yet not unpraised, not without a kind of honor, You walk at last into the underworld; Untouched by sickness, broken by no sword. What woman has ever found your way to d**h?ANTIGONE: [Antistrophe 1] How often I have heard the store of Niobe,6 Tantalos' wretched daughter, how the stone Clung fast about her, ivy-close: and they say The rain falls endlessly And rifting soft snow; her tears are never done. I feel the loneliness of her d**h in mine. CHORUS: But she was born of heaven, and you Are woman, woman-born. If her d**h is yours, A mortal woman's, is this not for you Glory in our world and in the world beyond? ANTIGONE: You laugh at me. Ah, friends, friends, Can you not wait until I am dead? O Thebes, O men many-charioted, in love with Fortune, Dear spring of Dirce, sacred Theban grove, Be witnesses for me, denied all pity, Unjustly judge! and think a word of love For her whose path turns Under dark earth, where there are no more tears. CHORUS: You have pa**ed beyond human daring and come at last Into a place of stone where Justice sits 690 I cannot tell What shape of your father's guilt appears in this. ANTIGONE: [Antistrophe 2] You have touched it at last: that bridal bed Unspeakable, horror of son an mother mingling: Their crime, infection of all our family! O Oedipus, father and brother! Your marriage strikes from the grave to murder mine. I have been a stranger here in my own land: All my life The blasphemy of my birth has followed me. CHORUS: Reverence is a virtue, but strength Lives in established law: that must prevail. You have made your choice, Your d**h is the doing of your conscious hand. ANTIGONE: [Epode] Then let me go, since all your words are bitter, And the very light of the sun is cold to me. Lead me to my vigil, where I must have Neither love nor lamentation; no song, but silence. [*CREON interrupts impatiently.*] CREON: If dirges and planned lamentations could put of d**h, Men would be singing for ever. [*To the SERVANTS:*] Take her, go! You know your orders: take her to the vault And leave her alone there. And if she lives or dies, That's her affair, not ours: our hands are clean. ANTIGONE: O tomb, vaulted bride-bed in eternal rock, Soon I shall be with my own again Where Persephone Welcome the thin ghost underground: And I shall see my father again, and you, mother, And dearest Polyneices–– Dearest indeed To me, since it was my hand That washed him clean and poured the ritual wine: And my reward is d**h before my time! And yet, as men's hearts know, I have done no wrong, I have not sinned before God. Or if I have, I shall know the truth in d**h. But if the guilt Lies upon Creon who judged me, then, I pray, May his punishment equal my own. CHORAGOS: O pa**ionate heart, Unyielding, tormented still by the same winds! CREON: Her guards shall have good cause to regret their delaying. ANTIGONE: Ah! That voice you no reason to think voice of d**h! CREON: I can give you no reason to think you are mistaken. ANTIGONE: Thebes, and you my fathers' gods, And rulers of Thebes, you see me now, the last Unhappy daughter of a line of kings, Your kings, led away to d**h. You will remember What things I suffer, and at what men's hands, Because I would not transgress the laws of heaven. [*To the GUARDS, simply:*] Come: let us wait no longer. [*Exit ANTIGONE, L., guarded.*]**ODE IV**CHORUS:[Strophe 1] All Danae's beauty was locked away In a brazen cell where the sunlight could not come: A small room, still as any grave, enclosed her. Yet she was a princess too, And Zeus in a rain of gold poured love upon her. O child, child, No power in wealth or war Or tough sea-blackened ships Can prevail against untiring Destiny![Antistrophe 1] And Dryas' son Also, that furious king, Bore the god's prisoning anger for his pride: Sealed up by Dionysos in deaf stone, His madness died among echoes. So at the last he learned what dreadful power His tongue had mocked: For he had profaned the revels, And fired the wrath of the nine Implacable Sisters That love the sound of the flute.[Strophe 2] And old men tell a half-remembered tale Of horror done where a dark ledge splits the sea And a double surf beats on the gray shores: How a king's new woman, sick With hatred for the queen he had imprisoned, Ripped out his two son's eyes with her bloody hands While grinning Ares watched the shuttle plunge Four times: four blind wounds crying for revenge,[Antistrophe 2] Crying, tears and blood mingled, ––Piteously born, Those sons whose mother was of heavenly birth! Her father was the god of the North Wind And she was cradled by gales, She raced with young colts on the glittering hills And walked untrammeled in the open light: But in her marriage d**hless Fate found means To build a tomb like yours for all her joy.