MY friends, the deed's resolved -- that with all haste I will kill my children and set forth from Corinth, Not, hesitating here, yield up my sons For other and less loving hands to murder. Die they must, either way; and since they must, Then I will slay them that did bring them forth. Come steel thyself, my heart. What help to linger Shrinking to do that dreadful thing thou must? The sword, O miserable hand, the sword -- Take it and onward to that bitter race Thy feet must run! No weakening now, no thought Of thy sons, how dear they are, how thou didst once Give life to them. For this one little day Forget thy babes, and, after, weep for them. For though thou slay them, yet dear-loved were they, Thine own, -- and I a miserable woman. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...A LOVE LETTER by PAUL LAURENCE DUNBAR THE TWELVE-FORTY-FIVE (FOR EDWARD J. WHEELER) by ALFRED JOYCE KILMER TENNYSON by THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH BEAUTIFUL EYES by JOHANNA AMBROSIUS THE PLOUGHMAN by KARLE WILSON BAKER IN VINCULIS; SONNETS WRITTEN IN AN IRISH PRISON: DEEDS MIGHT HAVE BEEN by WILFRID SCAWEN BLUNT THE SHRINE by HARRY RANDOLPH BLYTHE TO MISS FERRIER; ENCLOSING THE ELEGY ON SIR J. H. BLAIR by ROBERT BURNS |