thou lost
In blindness, long ago, dreaming, some-wise,
She would be true with thee, whose sin and lies
Thyself had tasted in my father’s place? 
And then, that thou wert happy, when thy days
Were all one pain?  Thou knewest ceaselessly
Her kiss a thing unclean, and she knew thee
A lord so little true, so dearly won! 
So lost ye both, being in falseness one,
What fortune else had granted; she thy curse,
Who marred thee as she loved thee, and thou hers... 
And on thy ways thou heardst men whispering,
“Lo, the Queen’s husband yonder”—­not “the King.” 
  And then the lie of lies that dimmed thy brow,
Vaunting that by thy gold, thy chattels, Thou
Wert Something; which themselves are nothingness. 
Shadows, to clasp a moment ere they cease. 
The thing thou art, and not the things thou hast,
Abideth, yea, and bindeth to the last
Thy burden on thee:  while all else, ill-won
And sin-companioned, like a flower o’erblown,
Flies on the wind away. 
                         Or didst them find
In women ...  Women?...  Nay, peace, peace!  The blind
Could read thee.  Cruel wast thou in thine hour,
Lord of a great king’s house, and like a tower
Firm in thy beauty. [Starting back with a look of loathing. 
                    Ah, that girl-like face! 
God grant, not that, not that, but some plain grace
Of manhood to the man who brings me love: 
A father of straight children, that shall move
Swift on the wings of War.

    So, get thee gone! 
Naught knowing how the great years, rolling on,
Have laid thee bare, and thy long debt full paid. 
  O vaunt not, if one step be proudly made
In evil, that all Justice is o’ercast: 
Vaunt not, ye men of sin, ere at the last
The thin-drawn marge before you glimmereth
Close, and the goal that wheels ’twixt life and death.

LEADER.

Justice is mighty.  Passing dark hath been
His sin:  and dark the payment of his sin.

ELECTRA (with a weary sigh, turning from the body).

Ah me!  Go some of you, bear him from sight,
That when my mother come, her eyes may light
On nothing, nothing, till she know the sword....
    [The body is borne into the hut.  PYLADES goes with it.

ORESTES (looking along the road).

Stay, ’tis a new thing!  We have still a word
To speak...

ELECTRA.

What?  Not a rescue from the town
Thou seest?

ORESTES.

’Tis my mother comes:  my own
Mother, that bare me. [He takes off his crown.

ELECTRA (springing, as it were, to life again, and moving where she can see the road).

Straight into the snare! 
Aye, there she cometh,—­Welcome in thy rare
Chariot!  All welcome in thy brave array!

ORESTES.

What would we with our mother?  Didst thou say
Kill her?