Euripides' ALCESTIS Complete

Translated by Gilbert Murray. - Cf. An Introduction to Euripides' Alcestis by Murray

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74 pages - You are on Page 59

But I am one who hath no right to stay
Alive on earth; one that hath lost his way
In fate, and strays in dreams of life long past....
Friends, I have learned my lesson at the last.
I have my life. Here stands my house. But now
How dare I enter in? Or, entered, how
Go forth again? Go forth, when none is there
To give me a parting word, and I to her?...
Where shall I turn for refuge? There within,
The desert that remains where she hath been
Will drive me forth, the bed, the empty seat
She sat in; nay, the floor beneath my feet
Unswept, the children crying at my knee
For mother; and the very thralls will be
In sobs for the dear mistress that is lost.
That is my home! If I go forth, a host
Of feasts and bridal dances, gatherings gay
Of women, will be there to fright me away
To loneliness. Mine eyes will never bear
The sight. They were her friends; they played with her.
And always, always, men who hate my name
Will murmur: "This is he who lives in shame
Because he dared not die! He gave instead
The woman whom he loved, and so is fled
From death. He counts himself a man withal!
And seeing his parents died not at his call
He hates them, when himself he dared not die!"
Such mocking beside all my pain shall I
Endure.... What profit was it to live on,
Friend, with my grief kept and mine honour gone?

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