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MYRTILLA

There to her in that gray hour,
That gray hour before the sun,
Cometh he she waiteth for,
Menelaus like a ghost,
Like a dry leaf tempest-tost,
Stalking restless, her reproach.

PASIPHASSA

There alone, those two, long severed been,
Eye each other, one wild heart between.

SITYS

“O thou ruinous face,
O thou fatally fair,
O the pity of thee!
What dost thou there,
Watching the madness of me?”

CHTHONOE

Him seemed her eyes were pools of dark
To drown him, yet no word she spake;
But gazing, grave as a lonely house,
All her wonder thrilled to wake.

RHODOPE

“By thy roses and snow,
By thy sun-litten hair,
By thy low bosom and slow
Pondered kisses, O hear!

“By thy glimmering eyes,
By thy burning cheek,
By thy murmuring sighs,
Speak, Helen, O speak!

“Ruinous Face, O Ruinous Face,
Art thou come so early,” he said,
“So early forth from the wicked bed?”

GORGO

Him she pondered, grave and still,
Stirring not from her safe place:
He marked the glow, he felt the thrill,
He saw the dawn new in her face.

MYRTILLA

Within her low voice wailed the tone
Of one who grieves and prays for death:
“Lord, I am come to be alone,
Alone here with my sorrow,” she saith.

PASIPHASSA

“False wife, what pity was thine
For hearth and altar, for man and child?
What is thy sorrow worth unto mine?”
She rocked, moaning, “I was beguiled!”

SITYS

Ten years’ woe for Troy and Greece
By her begun, the slim, the sweet,
Ended by her in final peace
Of him who loved her first of all;
Nor ever swerved from his high passion,
But through misery and shame
Saw her spirit like a flame
Eloquent of her sacred fashion–
Hers whose eyes are homes of light,
To which she tends, from which she came.

1912.

[2] Helen Redeemed, the first poem in this book, was originally conceived as a drama. Here is a scene from it, the first after the Prologue, which would have been spoken by Odysseus. The action of the play would have begun with the entry of Helen.