"OEDIPUS REX": The Play

Scene.—Before the Palace of Oedipus at Thebes. A crowd of suppliants of all ages are waiting by the altar in front and on the steps of the Palace; among them the Priest of Zeus. As the Palace door opens and Oedipus comes out all the suppliants with a cry move towards him in attitudes of prayer, holding out their olive branches, and then become still again as he speaks.

Oedipus.

My children, fruit of Cadmus’ ancient tree

New springing, wherefore thus with bended knee

Press ye upon us, laden all with wreaths

And suppliant branches? And the city breathes

Heavy with incense, heavy with dim prayer

And shrieks to affright the Slayer.—Children, care

For this so moves me, I have scorned withal

Message or writing: seeing ’tis I ye call,

’Tis I am come, world-honoured Oedipus.

Old Man, do thou declare—the rest have thus

Their champion—in what mood stand ye so still,

In dread or sure hope? Know ye not, my will

Is yours for aid ’gainst all? Stern were indeed

The heart that felt not for so dire a need.

Priest.

O Oedipus, who holdest in thy hand

My city, thou canst see what ages stand

At these thine altars; some whose little wing

Scarce flieth yet, and some with long living

O’erburdened; priests, as I of Zeus am priest,

And chosen youths: and wailing hath not ceased

Of thousands in the market-place, and by

Athena’s two-fold temples and the dry

Ash of Ismênus’1 portent-breathing shore.

For all our ship, thou see’st, is weak and sore

Shaken with storms, and no more lighteneth

Her head above the waves whose trough is death.

She wasteth in the fruitless buds of earth,

In parchèd herds and travail without birth

Of dying women: yea, and midst of it

A burning and a loathly god hath lit

Sudden, and sweeps our land, this Plague of power;

Till Cadmus’ house grows empty, hour by hour,

And Hell’s house rich with steam of tears and blood.

O King, not God indeed nor peer to God

We deem thee, that we kneel before thine hearth,

Children and old men, praying; but of earth

A thing consummate by thy star confessed

Thou walkest and by converse with the blest;

Who came to Thebes so swift, and swept away

The Sphinx’s song, the tribute of dismay,

That all were bowed beneath, and made us free.

A stranger, thou, naught knowing more than we,

Nor taught of any man, but by God’s breath

Filled, thou didst raise our life. So the world saith;

So we say.

Therefore now, O Lord and Chief,

We come to thee again; we lay our grief

On thy head, if thou find us not some aid.

Perchance thou hast heard Gods talking in the shade

Of night, or eke some man: to him that knows,

Men say, each chance that falls, each wind that blows

Hath life, when he seeks counsel. Up, O chief

Of men, and lift thy city from its grief;

Face thine own peril! All our land doth hold

Thee still our saviour, for that help of old:

Shall they that tell of thee hereafter tell

“By him was Thebes raised up, and after fell!”

Nay, lift us till we slip no more. Oh, let

That bird of old that made us fortunate

Wing back; be thou our Oedipus again.

And let thy kingdom be a land of men,

Not emptiness. Walls, towers, and ships, they all

Are nothing with no men to keep the wall.

Oedipus.

My poor, poor children! Surely long ago

I have read your trouble. Stricken, well I know,

Ye all are, stricken sore: yet verily

Not one so stricken to the heart as I.

Your grief, it cometh to each man apart

For his own loss, none other’s; but this heart

For thee and me and all of us doth weep.

Wherefore it is not to one sunk in sleep

Ye come with waking. Many tears these days

For your sake I have wept, and many ways

Have wandered on the beating wings of thought.

And, finding but one hope, that I have sought

And followed. I have sent Menoikeus’ son,

Creon, my own wife’s brother, forth alone

To Apollo’s House in Delphi, there to ask

What word, what deed of mine, what bitter task,

May save my city.

And the lapse of days

Reckoned, I can but marvel what delays

His journey. ’Tis beyond all thought that thus

He comes not, beyond need. But when he does,

Then call me false and traitor, if I flee

Back from whatever task God sheweth me.

Priest.

At point of time thou speakest. Mark the cheer

Younder. Is that not Creon drawing near?

[They all crowd to gaze where Creon is approaching in the distance.

Oedipus.

O Lord Apollo, help! And be the star

That guides him joyous as his seemings are!

Priest.

Oh! surely joyous! How else should he bear

That fruited laurel wreathed about his hair?