Stasimon 7
[Choral 1]
Ah, me, ah, me! Now, indeed, is it for us to bewail in full the curse on our blood—ill-fated sisters as we are—deriving from our father! In former time we bore the long toil without pause,
1670
Antigone
and now at the last we bring to tell a sight and experience that baffle reason.
1675
Antigone
It is possible to conjecture, friends.
Antigone
Precisely in the way you could most wish for: indeed, in a way in which neither Ares took him, nor the sea,
but instead he was snatched away to the fields which no one may see, by some swift, strange doom. Wretched me! For us a night like death has descended on our eyes;
1680
how shall we find our hard livelihood, roaming to some far land, or on the waves of the sea?
1685
Ismene
I do not know. If only murderous Hades would join me in death to my aged father!
Wretched me! I cannot live the life that must be mine.
1690
Chorus
Best of daughters, you both must bear the will of the gods. Do not be inflamed with too much grief;
what you have encountered is not to be blamed.
1695
Antigone
There is longing even for woes. What was in no way dear was dear, so long as I held him in my embrace.
Father, Dear, clothed in the darkness of the underworld forever! Never in your absence will you not be dear to me and to my sister here.
1700
Antigone
He fared as he desired.
Antigone
He died on the foreign ground that he desired; he has his well-shaded bed beneath the ground for ever; and he did not leave behind unwept sorrow. With these weeping eyes, father, I lament you;
1705
nor do I know how in my wretchedness I must still my grief for you that is so immense. Alas! You wanted to die in a foreign land, but you died without me near.
1710
Ismene
Wretched me! What fate
awaits you and me, dear, orphaned as we are of our father?
1715
Chorus
Cease from your grief, dear girls, since his end is blessed. No one is beyond the reach of evil.
1720
[Choral 2]
Dear, let us hasten back.
Antigone
A longing fills my soul—
1725
Antigone
To see the netherworld home.
Antigone
Wretched me! Of our father.
Ismene.
And how can this be right?
Surely you understand?
1730
Antigone
Why this rebuke?
1730
Ismene.
And surely you know this, too—
Antigone
What more would you tell me?
Ismene
That he perished without a tomb, apart from everyone.
Antigone
Lead me there, and then kill me, too.
Ismene
Unhappy me! Abandoned and helpless,
where am I now to live my wretched life?
1735
Chorus
Dear girls, do not be afraid.
Antigone
But where shall I flee?
Chorus
Already a refuge has been found—
Oedipus
What do you mean?
Chorus
—That no harm befall you.
1740
Chorus
What do you think?
Antigone
How we are to go home, I cannot tell.
Chorus
Do not seek to go.
Antigone
Trouble surrounds us.
Chorus
And previously it bore heavily.
Antigone
Then it was desperate, but now even crueler.
1745
Chorus
Vast, then, is the sea of your troubles.
Antigone
Alas, alas! Zeus, where shall we turn?
To what last hope does the divinity now drive us?
1750