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Agamemnon, choral anapests, 40-59
click on Greek text to hear it recited; scroll down for translation
It is now the tenth year since Priam’s great opponent,
King Menelaus, and with him Agamemnon,
in twin-throned, twin-sceptred honor, mighty yoke team
of Zeus, the Atreidae, sped from this land
a thousand ships of Argives, the mustered fleet in arms,
with a great cry of War, out of rage like that of vultures
who in sky-shot pain for their brood above nest
wheel high and wide, feathery oars pumping,
their nest-bed toils for their chicks all lost;
till one of those on high, Apollo, Pan, or Zeus,
hearing the shrill bird-wails of high heaven’s visitors,
in late vengeance sends the Fury on the head of the transgressor.
translation © 2003 Alan Shaw
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