Fleeing like panic-struck Asian array—
O earth, O earth!—away and away.
Ah me, strange dames, whitherward can I flee,
Through the cloud-dappled welkin my flight up-winging,
Or over the sea
Which the hornèd Ocean with arms enringing
Coileth around earth endlessly?
Chorus.
What is it, Helen's servant, Ida's son?1380
Phrygian.
Ilion, Ilion, woe is me!
Phrygian city, and mount Idæan
Holy and fertile, I wail for thee
In the chariot-pæan, the chariot-pæan,[1]
With cry barbaric!—thy ruin came
Of the bird-born beauty, the swan-plumed dame,
Curst Helen the lovely, Leda's child,
A vengeance-fiend to the towers uppiled
By Apollo of carven stone.
Alas for thy moan, thy moan,1390
Dardania!—the steeds that Zeus gave erst
For his minion Ganymede, made thee accurst!
Chorus.
Tell clearly all that in the house befell:
For thy first words be vague: I can but guess.
- ↑ The precise significance of this is mere matter of conjecture.
