The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley - LightNovelsOnl.com
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CYCLOPS: Ah me! indeed, what woe has fallen upon me!
But, wretched nothings, think ye not to flee Out of this rock; I, standing at the outlet, Will bar the way and catch you as you pa.s.s.
CHORUS: What are you roaring out, Cyclops?
CYCLOPS: I peris.h.!.+ _675
CHORUS: For you are wicked.
CYCLOPS: And besides miserable.
CHORUS: What, did you fall into the fire when drunk?
CYCLOPS: 'Twas n.o.body destroyed me.
CHORUS: Why then no one Can be to blame.
CYCLOPS: I say 'twas n.o.body Who blinded me.
CHORUS: Why then you are not blind. _680
CYCLOPS: I wish you were as blind as I am.
CHORUS: Nay, It cannot be that no one made you blind.
CYCLOPS: You jeer me; where, I ask, is n.o.body?
CHORUS: Nowhere, O Cyclops.
CYCLOPS: It was that stranger ruined me:--the wretch _685 First gave me wine and then burned out my eye, For wine is strong and hard to struggle with.
Have they escaped, or are they yet within?
CHORUS: They stand under the darkness of the rock And cling to it.
CYCLOPS: At my right hand or left? _690
CHORUS: Close on your right.
CYCLOPS: Where?
CHORUS: Near the rock itself.
You have them.
CYCLOPS: Oh, misfortune on misfortune!
I've cracked my skull.
CHORUS: Now they escape you--there.
NOTE: _693 So B.; Now they escape you there 1824.
CYCLOPS: Not there, although you say so.
CHORUS: Not on that side.
CYCLOPS: Where then?
CHORUS: They creep about you on your left. _695
CYCLOPS: Ah! I am mocked! They jeer me in my ills.
CHORUS: Not there! he is a little there beyond you.
CYCLOPS: Detested wretch! where are you?
ULYSSES: Far from you I keep with care this body of Ulysses.
CYCLOPS: What do you say? You proffer a new name. _700
ULYSSES: My father named me so; and I have taken A full revenge for your unnatural feast; I should have done ill to have burned down Troy And not revenged the murder of my comrades.
CYCLOPS: Ai! ai! the ancient oracle is accomplished; _705 It said that I should have my eyesight blinded By your coming from Troy, yet it foretold That you should pay the penalty for this By wandering long over the homeless sea.
ULYSSES: I bid thee weep--consider what I say; _710 I go towards the sh.o.r.e to drive my s.h.i.+p To mine own land, o'er the Sicilian wave.
CYCLOPS: Not so, if, whelming you with this huge stone, I can crush you and all your men together; I will descend upon the sh.o.r.e, though blind, _715 Groping my way adown the steep ravine.
CHORUS: And we, the s.h.i.+pmates of Ulysses now, Will serve our Bacchus all our happy lives.
EPIGRAMS.
[These four Epigrams were published--numbers 2 and 4 without t.i.tle--by Mrs. Sh.e.l.ley, "Poetical Works", 1839, 1st edition.]
1.--TO STELLA.
FROM THE GREEK OF PLATO.
Thou wert the morning star among the living, Ere thy fair light had fled;-- Now, having died, thou art as Hesperus, giving New splendour to the dead.
2.--KISSING HELENA.
FROM THE GREEK OF PLATO.
Kissing Helena, together With my kiss, my soul beside it Came to my lips, and there I kept it,-- For the poor thing had wandered thither, To follow where the kiss should guide it, _5 Oh, cruel I, to intercept it!
