through dreams and daydreams, like a stately carriage
touring the level landscape of my marriage.
Yet nothing worked. My husband sent me here
to Troezen, far from Athens; once again the dear
face shattered me; I saw Hippolytus
each day, and felt the ancient, venomous
yearnings bum my heartstrings-no secret fire,
but Venus clawing down her prey-entire,
unveiled, enraged. Each moment, terrified
by loose incessant passions, now I cried
for death to save my glory and expel
my gloomy frenzy from
this
world, my hell.
And yet your tears and words bewildered me,
and so endangered my tranquillity,
at last I spoke. Nurse, I shall not repent,
if you will leave me the passive content
of dry silence and solitude, the choice
of dying unenlightened by your voice.
1
II
PHAEDRA:
I hunger for Theseus. Always in my eye
he wanders, not as he appeared in hell,
lascivious eulogist of any belle
he found there, from the lowest to the Queen;
no, faithful, airy, just a little mean
through virtue, charming all, yet young and new,
such as they paint the gods-a man like you.
Your valiant shyness would have graced
his
speech,
he would have had your stature, eyes, and reach,
Prince, when he flashed across our Cretan waters,
the loved enslaver of King Minos' daughters.
when your just vengeance thundered through its skull.
of Athens' youth against my father's power,
1. From Act I, Scene 3.
