Page:Prometheus Bound (Webster 1866).djvu/21



We behold thee, and a haze,

Prometheus, dims our eyes,

Of awe and of many tears for thee,

When we look at thee on this rock and see

Thy body parched by hot rays

And fettered with iron in shameful chains.

But now in Olympus a new lord reigns,

And Zeus kings in lawless guise,

By laws that are wondrously changed of late,

And those who were great

In the ancient days meet a pitiful fate.

If he had but sent me down under earth,

Under Hades thronged with the dead, yea down

Into boundless Tartarus, penning me thus,

By his barbarous will, in unyielding chains,

That so nor god nor any should joy

At beholding! But now I am made a mock

In the open skies and, most wretched, bear

Pangs that make mirth for my foes.