Electra to Orestes


Who but the mad
a brother's return,
we might have had
would wait ten years,
to seek revenge
on any morning?



Dark kin are you
come all this way
Your ways and words
of what I am
Burdens laid down
charges and trusts
obligations
necessity
in long years doing
burying my heart
growing slow toward
in very truth
from my own village.
remind me
in my soul.
long ago
I cast aside
I betrayed
I abandoned
well enough,
in petty things
a death in life.



All the while,
the hind's body
our sister's death
Sacrificed
Vengeance
betrayed,
our father's death
Our mother's hand,
Huge in the gate
I am not stone
behind my eyes,
clad in blood
upon the altar.
to speed the ships.
gone cold;
on his return
in the yellow dust.
steeped in his blood.
lions stare down
to watch unmoved.



Not enough
clean of death
I am a mass
black with old blood,
that bleed anew
You stand
restoring Law
and excavate
to walk and speak
and call that life.
of half-healed wounds
raised scabs
to your touch.
and offer peace,
you change the world
my soul.



This be my death, then I go willing.

Jo Walton, Spring 1996, Lancaster. Do read and enjoy this poem but do not reproduce it in any way without permission

© Jo Walton (bluejo@gmail.com)

Back to Lake-Wife
Forward to Mary Magdalene
Up to the index