Page:Choëphoroe (Murray 1923).djvu/69

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Behold your linkèd conquerors! Behold

My Father's foes, the spoilers of the fold!

Oh, lordly were these twain, when thronèd high,

And lovely now, as he who sees them lie

Can read, two lovers faithful to their troth!

They vowed to slay my father, or that both

As one should die, and both the vows were true!

And mark, all ye who hear this tale of rue,

This robe, this trap that did my father greet,

Irons of the hand and shackling of the feet!

Outstretch it north and south: cast wide for me

This man-entangler, that our Sire may see—

Not mine, but He who watcheth all deeds done,

Yea, all my mother's wickedness, the Sun—

And bear me witness, when they seek some day

To judge me, that in justice I did slay

This woman: for of him I take no heed.

He hath the adulterer's doom, by law decreed.

But she who planned this treason 'gainst her own

Husband, whose child had lived beneath her zone—

Oh, child of love, now changed to hate and blood!—

What is she? Asp or lamprey of the mud,

That, fangless, rotteth with her touch, so dire

That heart's corruption and that lust like fire?

Woman? Not woman, though I speak right fair.

A dead man's winding-sheet? A hunter's snare?

A trap, a toil, a tangling of the feet.

I think a thief would get him this, a cheat