2._
Whence from Ida toward the hill of Hermes leapt the light that said
Troy was fallen, a torch funereal for the king's triumphal head.
Dire indeed the birth of Leda's womb that had God's self to sire
Bloomed, a flower of love that stung the soul with fangs that gnaw
like fire:
But the twin-born human-fathered sister-flower bore fruit more
dire.
Scarce the cry that called on airy heaven and all swift winds on
wing,
Wells of river-heads, and countless laugh of waves past reckoning,
Earth which brought forth all, and the orbed sun that looks on
everything,
Scarce that cry fills yet men's hearts more full of heart-devouring
dread
Than the murderous word said mocking, how the child whose blood he
shed
Might clasp fast and kiss her father where the dead salute the
dead.
But the latter note of anguish from the lips that mocked her lord,
When her son's hand bared against the breast that suckled him his
sword,
How might man endure, O AEschylus, to hear it and record?
How might man endure, being mortal yet, O thou most highest, to
hear?
How record, being born of woman? Surely not thy Furies near,
Surely this beheld, this only, blasted hearts to death with fear.
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