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CHORUS
What do you mean?
PHILOKTETES
You wanted to take me to hateful Troy.
CHORUS
I think that is best.
PHILOKTETES
Then leave me, and now.
CHORUS
That is good news indeed.
I'll willingly obey your command.
Let us go, men, back to our stations.
PHILOKTETES
No, strangers, by the G.o.ds, stay here!
I beg you!
CHORUS
Be still.
PHILOKTETES
I beg you, stay with me.
CHORUS
Why do you beseech us now?
PHILOKTETES
I am destroyed.
My foot, what will I do with you for what remains of my life?
Come back to me, friends.
CHORUS
Come back to do what? Have you changed your mind?
PHILOKTETES
It is not just to be angry when a man driven mad by stormy anguish speaks thoughtlessly.
CHORUS
Come with us, poor man, as we have asked.
PHILOKTETES
Never. Not even if the lord of lightning devours me in thunderous fire!
Let Troy be ruined and all those before its walls who cast me away here in my lameness!
Friends, grant me one last request.
CHORUS
What is it?
PHILOKTETES
If you have a sword, or an axe, or a knife, then bring it to me.
CHORUS
What will you do with it?
PHILOKTETES
I will cut off my head, cut off my foot, cut myself apart with my own hand.
My mind wants nothing but death.
CHORUS
Why?
PHILOKTETES
I want to find my father.
CHORUS
Where?
PHILOKTETES
In Hades. Surely he no longer stands in light.
Ancestral city, I wish I could see you, I who deserted your holy waters to help the Greeks, my enemies.
I am nothing now.
CHORUS
