The invincible strength of Necessity.

Yet of my present state I cannot speak,

Cannot be silent. The gifts I gave to man

Have harnessed me beneath this harsh duress.

I hunted down the stealthy fount of fire

In fennel stored, which schooled the race of men

In every art and taught them great resource.

Such the transgression which I expiate,

A helpless captive, shackled, shelterless!

Ah ah, ea ea!

What echo, what fragrance unseen wingeth nigh me?

Is it divine or mortal, or of mingled blood?

Visiting this desolate edge of earth,

Spectator of my agony — with what purpose else?

Behold in chains confined an ill-starred god,

The detested of Zeus and rejected of all

The celestial band that assembleth aloft

In the heavenly courts of the Highest,

For my too great love of the children of men!

Pheu, pheu! what again is the murmur I hear

As of birds hard by?

And the air is astir with the whispering beat

Of their hurrying wings.

Oh, fearful is all that approacheth.

CHORUS of OCEANIDS (Strophe 1)

O be not fearful —as a friend in flight contending to this rock my airy voyage have I winged.

Eager for this adventure, my father’s leave hardly I won.

Swiftly I rode on the flying breezes.

I heard afar off the reverberating echoes in my hollow cave, and unflushed with the shame of maidens

I sped on my chariot-steed unsandalled.

PROMETHEUS

Aiai, aiai!

Daughters of Tethys, the bride many-childed of

Oceanus, who with unslumbering tides

Doth encompass the earth,

Bear witness, behold how cruelly bound

And enchained in a wild and precipitous glen

I shall keep my disconsolate vigil!

CHORUS(Antistrophe 1)

I see, Prometheus, and a mist of grief descendeth on my vision, tears are springing to my eyes

Thus to behold thy beauty by day and night blasted in these

Adamant shackles of shame and torment.

For new the rulers who are throned above in heaven, and the laws of Zeus are new, framed for a harsh dominion.

The mighty of old he hath brought to nothing.

PROMETHEUS

O would in the boundless abyss of the earth,

Bottomless Tartarus,

Where Hades doth welcome the souls of the dead,

In invincible bondage my body were crushed,

That nor god nor another might mock my estate!

But here I am hung as a plaything of storms

And a mark for my enemies’ laughter!

CHORUS(Strophe 2)

What god is he so hard of heart that such a spectacle could delight?

Who doth not share thy sufferings, save Zeus? For in his spirit is no pity. Inflexibly

Fixed on vengeance, still his wrath smiteth the Sons of the Sky; ay, and shall not soften

Till his heart have its fill of revenge, or a mightier

Hand from him plunder his stolen kingdom.

PROMETHEUS

Yet of me, yet of me, though battered, and bent,

Limb-pierced by his shackles of insolent wrong,

Shall the prince who presideth in heaven have need,

To reveal him the new-found plan whereby