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[622-646] Prometheus Bound
Io
145
One further boon: what term shall end my wanderings? what time is
ordained for my peace?
PROMETHEUS
Better for you not to know than to know.
Io
Yet hide not what remains for me to endure.
PROMETHEUS
SO jnuch alone I am willing to grant.
Io
Why then do you delay? I would know all.
PROMETHEUS
It is not churlishness; I am loth to bruise your heart.
Io
Spare me not further than I myself desire.
PROMETHEUS
Since you so crave, it is well; hear me then.
LEADER OF THE CHORUS
Nay, not yet. Grant me also a share in your grace. Let us first hear
from her the story of her sorrow and the disasters that prey on her life.
Then do you declare to her what struggle still remains.
PROMETHEUS
Tis for thee, Io, to bestow this favor; and fittingly, for these are thy
father's sisters. Time is not lost, I deem, in bewailing and mourning oui
fate when answering tears stand ready in the listener's eye.
Io
Hard would it be to disregard your wish;
And if my words have credit in your ears
The tale is rendered. Yet as one who speaks
And still laments, my sorrows I recount,—
How wild, perturbing wonders in my soul
Wrought by the will of heaven, and how in shape
This bestial transformation I endured.
For always in the drowsy hours of night
I, sleeping in my virgin chambers, saw
Strange visitations pass, and as they passed