Page:Trojan Women (Murray 1905).djvu/20

18

As the coilèd cords ye threw,

Held in the heart of Troy!

What sought ye then that ye came?

A woman, a thing abhorred:

A King's wife that her lord

Hateth: and Castor's shame

Is hot for her sake, and the reeds

Of old Eurôtas stir

With the noise of the name of her.

She slew mine ancient King,

The Sower of fifty Seeds,

And cast forth mine and me,

As shipwrecked men, that cling

To a reef in an empty sea.

Who am I that I sit

Here at a Greek king's door,

Yea, in the dust of it?

A slave that men drive before,

A woman that hath no home,

Weeping alone for her dead;

A low and bruisèd head,

And the glory struck therefrom.

O Mothers of the Brazen Spear,

And maidens, maidens, brides of shame,

Troy is a smoke, a dying flame;

Together we will weep for her:

I call ye as a wide-wing'd bird

Calleth the children of her fold,