Stasimon 5
[Choral 1]
Ah, no! Our homecoming is lost! Ah, my king, you have killed me, the comrade of your voyage! Unhappy man—broken-hearted woman!
900
Tecmessa
His condition demands that we cry aiai.
Chorus
But by whose hand can the ill-fated man have contrived this end?
905
Tecmessa
He did it with his own hand; it is obvious. This sword which he planted in the ground and on which he fell convicts him.
Chorus
Ah, what blind folly I have displayed! All alone, then, you bled, unguarded by your friends! And I took no care, so entirely dull was I, so totally stupid. Where, where lies inflexible Ajax, whose name means anguish?
Tecmessa
No, he is not to be looked at! I will cover him over entirely with this enfolding shroud, since no one—no one, that is, who loves him—could bear to see him spurt the darkened gore of his self-inflicted slaughter up his nostrils and out of the bloody gash.
915
Ah, what shall I do? What loved one is there to lift you in his arms? Where is Teucer? How timely would be his arrival, if he would but come to compose the corpse of his brother here! Ah, unlucky Ajax, from so great a height you are fallen so low!
920
Even among your enemies you are worthy of mourning!
Chorus
You were bound, poor man, with that unbending heart you were bound, it seems, to fulfill a harsh destiny of limitless toils! So wild to my ears
925
were the words of hatred which in your fierce mood you moaned against the Atreidae with such deadly passion. True it is that that moment was a potent source of sorrows,
930
when the arms were made the prize for a contest in the skills of warfare!
935
Chorus
True anguish, I know, pierces your heart.
Chorus
I do not wonder, lady, that you wail and wail again, when you have just lost one so loved.
940
Tecmessa
It is for you to analyze my troubles, but for me to feel them too fully.
Tecmessa
Oh, my son, to what a heavy yoke of slavery
we advance! What cruel task-masters stand over us!
945
Chorus
Ah, the deeds of the two ruthless Atreidae which you name in our present grief would be unthinkable! May the gods hold them back!
