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My sire, whom I had hoped to bear
Safe to the hills with chiefest care,
Refused to lengthen out his span
And live on earth an exiled man.
'You, you,' he cries 'bestir your flight,
Whose blood is warm, whose limbs are light
Had Heaven not willed my life to cease,
Heaven would have kept my home in peace.
Enough, that I have once been saved,
Survivor of a town enslaved.
Now leave me: be your farewell said
To this my corpse, and count me dead.
My hand shall win me death: the foe
Such mercy as I need will show,
Will strip my spoils, and pass for brave.
He lacks not much that lacks a grave.
Long have I lived to curse my birth,
A useless cumberer of the earth,
E'en from the day when Heaven's dread sire
In anger scathed me with his fire.'

So talked he, obstinately set:
While we, our eyes with sorrow wet,
All on our knees, wife, husband, boy,
Implore—O let him not destroy
Himself and us, nor lend his weight
To the incumbent load of fate!
He hears not, but refuses still,
Unchanged alike in place and will.
Desperate, again to arms I fly,
And make my wretched choice to die:
For what deliverance now was mine,
What help in fortune or design?
'What? leave my sire behind and flee?
Such words from you? such words to me?