Page:Four Plays of Aeschylus (Cookson).djvu/18

6 So sadly my quick spirit graces

With groanings of death griefs that live,

And I cry unto Apia's high places

My broken speech to forgive,

And falling down on my linen veil

I mar with rents its fabric frail,

Tissue of Sidon's weaving.

With amplest oblation

To high heaven we come,

For hope's consummation,

When death's wind is dumb;

But alack! for the woes dark-heaving,

The billow whose path none traces,

Nor what strand on its crest I shall reach!

I cry unto Apia's high places

To forgive my broken speech,

And falling oft on my linen veil

I rend and mar its fabric frail,

Tissue of Sidon's weaving.

Thus far the oar right well hath sped;

And the bark flax-sewn to fend salt seas,

With never a flaw in the following breeze

Nor winter storm to dread,

Hath constant been as my prayers and vows:

And I pray the Father that all doth scan,

Here on firm earth, that he may send

To well-begun a happy end;

So I, that seed am of his spouse

August, may flee the embrace of man

And live unlorded and unwed.