Tereus in Fragments: a Lost Play of Sophocles

TEREUS IN FRAGMENTS: A LOST PLAY OF SOPHOCLES

by Lisa Maurizio Lewiston ME 04240 [email protected]

Tereus in Fragments is based on an ancient Greek myth about Tereus’ (male) violence and Philomela and Procne’s (female) revenge. It has been the subject of several modern dramas, most recently Joanna Laurens’ The Three Birds. Lisa Maurizio’s Tereus in Fragments: A Lost Play of Sophocles, however, differs from most modern adaptations of this myth in several respects. Her play more closely follows ancient tragic Greek conventions, especially Sophocles’ original, though now largely lost, tragedy Tereus. Philomela, for example, is a mute character in this play, as she seems to have been in Sophocles’ Tereus. In addition, Maurizio has translated and incorporated the few lines that survive from Sophocles’ play. More notably, Maurizio focuses less on Tereus’ violence (or male violence in general, the theme of many modern adaptations of this myth) and more on Procne’s longing for her sister and the fluidity of female identity. To this end, Maurizio has incorporated women’s poetry from around the world in her script, from Sappho’s ancient Greek lyrics to Forugh Farrokhzad’s modern Iranian verse.

Copyrighted by Lisa Maurizio This script is available for performance and production on the condition that the author is acknowledged and notified. Changes to the script require the author’s permission.

TEREUS IN FRAGMENTS: A LOST PLAY OF SOPHOCLES

CHARACTERS

Procne - young woman Tereus - man Philomela - mute young woman Nurse - old woman Itys - boy Servant - old man Chorus of Sirens - 3 bird-women when no mark appears, all three speak together, otherwise different voices are indicated by *, #, ^

ACT I Procne, an Athenian princess who resides in Thrace with her husband Tereus, desires to see her sister Philomela. A chorus of Sirens who nest on the roof of Tereus' palace encourage Procne to ask Tereus to allow the sisters to visit one another. Tereus reluctantly sets off to Athens to fetch Philomela. ACT II Tereus returns to Thrace with a mute Philomela. Philomela gives Procne a robe she wove during the journey from Athens to Thrace. Through the interpretation of Itys, Procne's son, and the Sirens, the robe reveals the story of Tereus' cruelty to Philomela. ACT III Philomela and Procne exact their revenge on Tereus for his cruelty. The Sirens promise a new myth will be added to their repetoire of tales and the gods transform all three protagonists into birds to save them from their own wayward hearts.

ACT I

NURSE If only man had never tried to capture the shadow of the moon's roundness in wooden hoops under laden wagons, had never slipped a rope around the leafless body of a newly cut tree, and perfumed linen sails with his desire, then Tereus the merchant from Thrace would never have turned the wine dark seas into trades routes and profits.

Ten years ago, Tereus the Thracian sailed to Greece. There he found Athens' citadel under attack, and saved it from certain destruction in exchange for one precious Athenian good: Procne, King Pandion's first-born daughter, princess of Athens.

The Athenians celebrated the union between Procne and Tereus, Greek and Barbarian, as much for its novelty as for their own safety.

When Tereus filled his ships with Athenian wares and one Athenian woman, Procne watched the white of her father's head and the white of her marble home become two dots on her dwindling horizon.

When Tereus' ship reached Thracian ports, Procne watched her dowry become coins in her new husband's hands. "Silver-loving is the whole barbarian race"i she mused, as Tereus unloaded his ship and traded everything she once owned, even her sun-whitened clothes, filled with

3 the hours and scents of her mother's body spent at the loom. Torn, some garments filled with the stench of fish and decorated Thracian docks. Others, still intact, were quickly folded and tucked into Thracian wagons.

Procne enters. PROCNE Barren is the home of Tereus the barbarian.

NURSE Procne wagered with herself, as she traveled from port to palace, and tried not to notice that she had entered the silence of a foreign tongue where she would not be able to find even a simple word, like "I."

Then, from loneliness fused with an old passion, Itys was born, marker of a sorrow Tereus never saw. Now Procne wanders aimlessly amongst Tereus' shining trophies.

She says nothing. I call to her. Itys, her son, calls to her.

Procne simultaneously murumurs "Itys, my son, calls to me."

NURSE "She sits, and between her she does not exist for the first time she does not exist; why should she answer?"ii

Procne simultaneously murumurs "why should I answer?"

PROCNE "I am nothing far away from my home. Often I have observed women's lot from this perspective”

4 [and now I live it] “we are as nothing"iii to those who peer in our long days spent among children and servants. Mere ghosts in a world shadowed by men.

"In childhood in our father's house we live the happiest life, I think, of all mankind; for folly always rears children in happiness. But when we have understanding and have come to youthful vigour, we are pushed out and sold, away from our paternal gods and from our parents, some to foreign husbands, some to barbarians, some to joyless homes, and some to homes that are [drafty and poor]. And this, once a single night has yoked us, we must approve and consider to be happiness."iv

NURSE "This is painful, Procne, that is clear; but none the less we are mortals and must put up with what the gods send us."v

PROCNE Despite the fact that the gods made you a servant, "I envy you for many features of your life, but most of all because you have no experience of any foreign land."vi You may walk a dusty road your mother once adored; hear laughter you have never forgotten. You may go where you have been, while I, an exile, wander always, even in sleep, and for home have only my skin.

NURSE "Mankind is one tribe; one day in the life of father and mother brought to birth all of us; none was born superior to any other."vii Still, do not sneer at the prosperity the gods have sent you. Whether in Greece or Thrace, you have lived only in wealthy houses.

5 Why not accept your new country as easily as you have accepted Tereus' treasures?

PROCNE I am one of Tereus' treasures. No human touch recalls me to myself so that I might know I live.

"Then I am alone; I trust no one but myself I caress my body I caress my awkward body.

Not that it matters; I hardly mind because I dreamt myself lying down a golden deer in the valley."viii

Nurse murmurs simultaneously

"Then I am alone; I trust no one but myself I caress my body I caress my awkward body.

Not that it matters; I hardly mind because I dreamt myself lying down a golden deer in the valley "

NURSE Procne, awake you are the mother of a living child. You have kindred blood here.

PROCNE I have a son whose wedding day will erase

6 the memory of lavender scenting my breast where he nursed.

NURSE No one can say what the future will hold. You will have more sons, more children.

PROCNE of Tereus...a long line of Thracians, each doubling my pain "like the layers of heavy night bedding heaped upon me, adding to the burden" of my sorrow.ix Though not yet a woman with white hair, I go nowhere in the future.

NURSE "Tangled white wisps like frosty grass lie on [my] head. The sidelocks, once glossy, cling to wilted flesh like splattered ink. I am an old woman"x with no children alone, and in a stranger's house I serve.

Procne murmurs simultaneously, "alone, and in a stranger's house I serve."

PROCNE If only I could disappear from myself, and never know how slight a thing I have become. Stripped of my native tongue, owning no possessions, I am mere possession. I cannot conjure myself into existence.

Nurse murmurs simultaneously, "owning no possessions, I am mere possession." I can not conjure myself into existence."

But once long ago, at my father's long tables, during the third libation, I sang songs of love in my mother tongue. Never had I felt so attached to life.

NURSE "When she began to remember it was summer; no one else existed and she took only what she wanted."xi

Procne murmurs simultaneously "When I began to remember it was summer; no one else existed and I took only what I wanted."

PROCNE Behind me there is a hill with a house, a quiet house, except for my sister's singing and a long stairway to a marble well, dark and filled with song. We carried pitchers of cool water, our hearts at ease on a quiet dusty road my mind still travels.

Now "every time the autumn wind whistles through my hollow eyes, my hollow eyes… I want not to say it, but it is"xii my sister, a small girl with auburn hair and a quick smile who knew me once, who could remember me to myself whom I want beyond all measure. "I loved her once...long ago She was like a child to me...

8 Philomela, little and graceless."xiii

"'Honestly I wish I were dead.' She was weeping when I left."xiv My sister Philomela. Little Philomela. One more taste of her voice, one more whisper! To waken from this Thracian silence, to live again in her song, if only for a moment.

NURSE Child, you speak as though what is not here is the only thing that is here. "Yet, what pleasure of beautiful things can there be, if the foolish plans of our wayward hearts lead us to sacrifice wealth which makes life happy?"xv Child, I advise you, do not sacrifice Thrace's wealth which protects you and your son. Do not, remembering too much, sacrifice your present life, and long only to seek your sister.

Voices are heard as chorus emerges.

CHORUS OF SIRENS Seek your sister, sister, sister.

NURSE Who speaks from the roof top of Tereus' palace and steals my words?

CHORUS OF SIRENS Once we sought our sister *in summer #in spring ^in Sicily in Sicily.

PROCNE Goddesses! Why do you nest on my roof top?

CHORUS OF SIRENS Goddesses? No, we are sisters.

PROCNE Yet you are not mortal. For you have wings and your voice descends from the sky like heavenly dew, decorating my ears with shining drops of ruby, topaz and emerald.

NURSE If you are goddesses, we honor you. If you are messengers from the gods above, we listen. If you bring news from the world below and carry the souls of the dead on your wings, tell us your sorrowful message and be gone.

CHORUS OF SIRENS Our names are many, though we are three. *Thelchteria #Aglaope ând Peisinoe. *Or Parthenope #Leucosia ând Legeia. *Or Molpe #Himeropia ând Thelchis.

*Daughters of Achelous #a river god *and Terpischore #a Muse. *So a myth, #or two *says.

PROCNE

10 Your names we do not know.

CHORUS OF SIRENS #We stopped collecting names. We're always together. and are mostly known as Sirens.

PROCNE Sirens?

CHORUS OF SIRENS *Once we were girls #mortal girls *Until we sprouted wings one summer #one spring In Sicily.

NURSE Sicily is in the West where the sun coils into itself until it is seen no more. There souls depart from this world, and float through caves into Hades' kingdom, land of the dead. No good omen, your visit. Why do you rest on the house of Tereus the Thracian?

PROCNE Surely, you have not seen my sister, in the land of the dead? You do not carry a message from her?

CHORUS OF SIRENS *Though we traveled far, we bring you no messages from the gods above #from the world below, ^or from your sister.

*We heard a song. #A voice fell like petals upon our senses, ^and awakened a desire to find something lost.

We tracked a rhythm we once knew. *We traveled east past Italy, over Greece and then north until we arrived here in Thrace, #a cold land the Greeks consider barbarian.

*We followed faint notes to the edge of the river Hebros, #not far from your house. *As the sound grew louder, we knew we had followed Orpheus' song, such a beautiful song #too beautiful. ^A song so beautiful Orpheus knew #hoped ^it could defeat death *Eurydice's death #Eurydice, his beloved.

*Once Orpheus, in love with his dead Eurydice, descended into the Underworld to regain her. There he played his lyre so sweetly #that Sisyphus stopped pushing his rock uphill, ^that Tantalus was no longer hungry, even though he had not eaten for over a hundred years and the ripest peaches rested in his hands.

*When Hades, #god of this dark kingdom, *and his young wife Persephone, #queen of the dead, *listened to Orpheus' song, they lamented that beauty could not last forever.

They remembered *summer #spring

12 Sicily, and granted his wish. #Eurydice could depart from their gloomy realm. She could follow Orpheus to the land of light on one condition. Orpheus must not look back *not turn #not falter ^not peek to see if Eurydice was behind him. *No matter, how long #how steep ^how rocky #how cold ^how dark the path from the Underworld was, Orpheus must not look back.

*Orpheus listened to Eurydice's footfall, as they climbed the treacherous path towards living. When only silence accompanied his song he whirled around #he peeked ^he looked back and watched the yellow folds of Eurydice's dress, *or was it her hair? ^drift downward.

*Orpheus refused this second ending to Eurydice's life, just as he refused the first. So he played his magical song, #his beautiful song ^the song that nearly won Eurydice from death.

*He played his magical, beautiful song so often, he intoxicated Thracian women. ^He made them insane with the sorrow of it #with the beauty of it ^with a longing that would never cease while he lived and played his song.

You know the myth. You know that such pure beauty, and sorrow, and longing cannot survive. *Thracian women tore him to shreds #to stop his singing ^so that they could return to living, even if Eurydice couldn't.

As we approached the Hebros river #near your house we hoped that we would find Orpheus, #that the myth had a different ending *that Orpheus was whole and complete.

*Covered in moss, with reeds for a neck Orpheus' head #only his head *swayed in the water and sang:

"I remember my singing Dragging soft memories from children's children.

I remember remembering I remember remembering. Singing. I am Orpheus."xvi

We left the Hebros river to fly home ^to escape his song.

Now we have come to rest on your house, before we return to Sicily, *to listen to you ^your song.

PROCNE

14 You have listened. Do you advise me to seek my sister?

CHORUS OF SIRENS You ask us if you should seek your sister. We are Sirens #winged girls. Here on your roof we watch. *Yet if it is advice you seek, we offer you this oldest and truest wisdom from a myth ^a tragedy.

Zoi tis anthrpn to kat aymar hops haydista porsunn. to des aurion aiei tuphlon herpei.

"Let every human being live every day taking care to have the most pleasurable things. Tomorrow crawls blind."xvii

PROCNE Then you advise that I seek her?

NURSE Young girls with wings, Sirens are known to sing dangerous songs, songs that lure sailors to a watery death in more than one myth. If tomorrow crawls blind, we should enjoy and protect what we have today.

PROCNE From above, mortal lives and desires may look different, small. Do you, Sirens, advise me to seek my sister?

CHORUS OF SIRENS We are Sirens. We mostly sing.

15 Look, there, Tereus approaches. Ask him. We sing, sing.

Tereus enters.

PROCNE Tereus, if I am to you as sweet, as red, as ripe, as pomegranates dotting trees in autumn, if our son Itys fallen through my thighs is your heart's delight, allow me to return to Athens.

I yearn to see what may be left of my family. My sister Philomela may be married or may still tend my father. Let me sail home, Tereus. To embrace her violet-scented robes To hold once more my childhood in my arms.

If I leave now I might return before Boreas the north wind outrages the sea and freezes waterways.

TEREUS What you ask is impossible. My wife amidst barrels and men on my cargo ship!

PROCNE Yet as your wife on your ship, I would be safe.

TEREUS A long journey is filled with many dangers.

PROCNE Yet your ships depart from your harbors and return daily.

TEREUS

16 It would be improper for my ships to transport my wife.

PROCNE What is proper about a man who refuses a woman weaker by far?

TEREUS A woman weaker by far should obey her husband.

PROCNE You want my obedience and win for yourself my indifference.

TEREUS This I have learned to endure, if only because my son, Itys, accompanies me. He will be a Thracian lord and tend my name long after I am gone. Still I will not allow you to sail seas unmoored to my house and my son.

PROCNE A house and child should not be a warlord's bulwark against his wife's pleas.

TEREUS A warlord's bulwark is his home, if it is filled with sons and a productive wife.

PROCNE A wife can be productive only if her desires are met. Tereus, let me see my sister. Let us talk together remembering our days together under the Greek sun, the coolness of water pooling in marble fountains.

Tereus allow me one more sip, one briefest glimpse of a lost past, just one more conversation.

Let me go home before more sons fill our house and I, worn and emptied,

17 silently watch them striding across the courtyard clattering shields and axes and swords. Too old to travel, too young to forget.

TEREUS When I plucked you from your father's house, you were all gossamer, pale and shimmering in the moonlight of Athens' hills. You were as ignorant and kind and sweet as the Greeks who received me in their tents as I picked through their makeshift camp where they made their plans to attack your father's stronghold.

Tereus the Thracian, Tereus the merchant. My goods captivated them as they did you. I sold and resold dyes, timber, and corn. And as I did, I marked a path through their ranks.

My men, they mistook for mere merchants. And so they neglected to observe we had carried weapons in carpets, fire in stalks. Easily we reached the lofty heights of the Acropolis, from where we cast our eagle eyes upon the leaders' tents and hurled fireballs and arrows, while they were dreaming of the gold they would twine around their wives' arms after tearing it off captured Athenian mistresses.

We rummaged through their burned and tattered tents in victory licking clean the goods they had only recently purchased. We drank their wine and ate their food as we tossed their corpses into the flames to grill our meat.

Your father, Pandion, gave you to me. My victory and my wealth intoxicated you. I filled this house with riches from every part of the world I have traveled. Pinned to the wall, hanging from rafters, Luxuries even your father's marble palace did not hold,

18 I have laid at your feet.

Yet you in your Hellenic hauteur grieve that once you let yourself be captivated by my wealth which now you despise because it reminds you of your own cheapness. Hoping to purchase your freedom from your own despair all you can do is imagine talking with your sister.

You think seeing your young sister will purge you of all the years you lived in my Thrace. Fine, then. I will procure your heart's desire. What am I not capable of purchasing? What will greed not sell? I will go again to Greece and pluck another daughter from Pandion's nest. I will bring you your sister.

Tereus departs.

CHORUS OF SIRENS You have won, Procne. Tereus will seek your sister.

PROCNE Yet, a strange sorrow sits on my chest. I fear my sister may be difficult to gain.

NURSE About these things we cannot know, for tomorrow crawls blind, like a child grasping to learn the world, never knowing what answer a question may bring.

Procne and Nurse walk into house.

CHORUS OF SIRENS

Once we sought our sister #playmate ^soulmate

19 *in fields blanketed in yellow. We picked narcissus flowers. Winter was a dream away and summer's heat was unimaginable #because it was spring in Sicily.

*As I was bending over, basket in hand, thunder #deafening thunder *seemed to shake the fields though the sky was blue #and no clouds had settled on the horizon. *When I stood, Persephone #daughter of the goddess Demeter ^soulmate #playmate *Persephone, our sister, had disappeared. ^All that remained was her scream floating in the dust of Hades' chariot.

Struggling to keep pace with Hades' eight black stallions, we ran. *We might have stopped running. #We might have left Persephone with Hades ^god of the Dead. *But then we saw the bay where suddenly Hades' chariot stopped.

*The silence clamored for our attention and we began to watch #as Hades pulled on the reins ôf those eight black stallions. #Suddenly, without even trying ôr even wanting #our feet lifted êver so slowly, #ever so slightly, above the ground.

20 ^Floating for one prolonged moment #glimpsing air beneath our feet, ^touching no stone or soft lush grass #floating slowly, ^floating slower than we might have run #we slowed into an unutterable pleasure. ^We watched.

*Cyane, #Sicily's most celebrated nymph, *raised herself from the waters of the bay where she dwelt. She saw Persephone's face ^and Hades' eight black stallions. *She raised herself up from her waters and called "You cannot steal Persphone."

*Cyane's arms spread to block Hades' way. But Hades, # god of the Dead *lashed his horses and drove his chariot #with screaming Persephone ^and those eight black stallions *through Cyane's waves into Tartarus. Persephone disappeared.

*Without words, Cyane "flowed into tears, into those waves Where she was known as goddess. #There one saw her limbs grow ^flaccid #and her bones, her nails turn ^fluid; #and her slender gliding features, ^Her green hair and her fingers, legs and feet Were first to go, #nor did her graceful limbs seem to show change ^as they slipped in cool waters; #Then shoulders, breasts and sides and back were ^tears flowing in streams and then her living blood in pale veins

21 ran to clearest, yielding spray, And nothing there for anyone to hold."xviii

As we watched, Cyane's voice become a trickling cry. *We whirled around to see #if Persephone ^and Hades' eight black stallions *might reappear. We felt our feet lift and we drifted above the soft spray where once Cyane dwelt #Sicily's most celebrated nymph. ^Looking no more at what we wished we had never witnessed, we saw iridescence on our arms. Where fear lifted us, we flew.

Winged now, we see more than we want to know.

22 ACT II Tereus followed by servant and Philomela enter.

TEREUS Traveling on the margins of land, I have procured goods beyond measure. A long journey yields many opportunities for gain# a fortunate matter because I had to pay your father almost as much for your sister's visit as I paid for your hand. Since I could be only a Thracian merchant in Athens, he made sure that I played the part well. He introduced me to no one of merit except those he needed to impress with my goods. Once I had bartered him back to prominence and had deposited every conceivable alliance in his lap, he agreed that I could take your sister to Thrace. My emptied coffers, like my person, no longer interested him. So I bring you this very extravagant gift.

PROCNE Extravagant, yes. Yet you did as you always do, you procured my desire, my sister.

TEREUS And you do as always. You receive joyfully.

PROCNE How can I not receive my eye, my hair with joy?

TEREUS Consumption has always been your pleasure.

PROCNE Tereus, you will consume. Your brother Dryas will fill your coffers. He has offered to give a feast in Philomela's honor. Thracians will bring gifts, hoping to win her hand.

23 The gifts will go to you, her guardian in Thrace.

TEREUS What do you report from my brother Dryas?

PROCNE Dryas will give a feast in Philomela's honor, so that Philomela may find a Thracian husband, as I have, and live here with me. Philomela, why so still? Why do tears and not joy fill your eyes? my eyes?

Procne lifts Philomela's hands and kisses them as she speaks.

TEREUS When is my brother planning to give this feast?

PROCNE Philomela, greet me so that I may talk with you again as we did beside the murmuring fountains of Greece. All that we had remains.

TEREUS My very own brother! When will my brother give this feast?

PROCNE A day after your arrival, he said. Philomela why so quiet?

TEREUS Then this very night or the next he plans to kill Itys, my son.

PROCNE Kill Itys? What madness do you bring into this house?

TEREUS On our long and treacherous journey home,

24 we met many swindlers, seers and prophets. Only one seemed to be touched by a divine and fierce hand. He said, "The one who feeds you eats you."

First I believed his words described your father's false hospitality. He shook violently and indicated the future, not the past, was in his oracle. He left. I did not fully understand his words until you said My always envious brother Dryas will give a feast. Seemingly for us, he plans it. But during the festivities, he will kill my son and marry Philomela to one of his lackeys. He will eat us blind! Of this I'm certain.

PROCNE Then my Philomela grieves because she knows this oracle?

TEREUS My brother has always envied me.

PROCNE My sister has always grieved before ill has come to pass.

TEREUS My brother must die as surely as my son must live. His sons will be exiled. His lands will revert to me.

PROCNE Philomela, is there no joy in seeing your sister, even if in Thrace? Speak.

TEREUS As if Thrace would limit her joy!

PROCNE Your brother means you no harm. Oracles may have many meanings and words can fall into the ruts of our heart's desire. Your brother's sons and lands, Tereus, are not yours. Besides, "human nature must think human thoughts, knowing that there is no master of the future,

25 of what is destined to be accomplished, except Zeus."xix

TEREUS Divine words are fate's desire, a desire we cannot understand. I will not gamble with my one son's life, on the slim hope that my brother's envy has been dulled by time. Itys, the only son you have produced to conserve my fortunes and my name, will live. Dryas will not. Every choice, even hope, has its price. The gods have spoken to me. I listen. I will pay them back with a sacrifice beyond measure# my brother's blood, and so guarantee my son Itys' life and my immortality.

Tereus departs.

PROCNE Philomela, you have refused to speak to me. Now Tereus has left. Tell me, are you...

SERVANT She is ill. A terrible disease contracted during our journey. Night fevers, days of ceaseless sweating. Then silence. As though a god snatched her voice. Some sailors said Tereus stole it and gave it to that prophet, payment in advance for the oracle. Others said women can not sail the seas safely and added winds and waves stole her voice so that they might speak in shells. Others said simply night fevers. Whatever the cause, she has paid dearly to visit you. Now she...

PROCNE AND SERVANT cannot speak.

26 PROCNE How can that be? No drug? no cure? no prayer?

SERVANT Do not try to cure her. "She does not want to return yet."xx "She has nothing to say."xxi

PROCNE Philomela? Is this true? that you cannot? that you want no remedy? That your voice will not return?

SERVANT A voice may return without words. Philomela brings you a gift, woman's work. She has woven you a colorful robe for cold winters.

PROCNE A Greek robe, such as we wore when we were young.

SERVANT No, this robe bears the marks of Thrace, for she made it during the long journey here. What her mind's eye saw, her hands wove, while her mouth never moved.

PROCNE Philomela, you are still the sweet generous child I loved. My eye, my heart, my childhood... Come, come inside....

Procne and Philomela exit.

SERVANT "A hint of her will end in melancholy not because night will fall softly but because she is still in pain for her sake."xxii

CHORUS OF SIRENS *A woman can speak, #knows what she does not say in words, ^that child is father to man. and men-children do not listen. *One woman speaks, and one woman weaves, #Philomela wove ^even if cloth does not survive time, #like myths.

One side of Philomela's robe tells the myth of Medusa *a woman #a Gorgon *a Gorgon woman with snakes in her hair and a strange smile #and fangs and wings. *There were three Gorgons, sisters, and one #the famous one *was named Medusa. Perseus was sent to capture her snaky head, a dangerous task #for a man. *For if any man looked at Medusa's face, he turned to stone. ^But Perseus knew to use a mirror to avoid her face.

You've heard this myth. You've heard Medusa's laugh. But there are many ways to tell a story.

*Philomela wove her story, #Medusa's story ^not his.

*Medusa felt remorse when she stared at herself in Perseus' mirror not because her hair was tied with snakes #not because fangs protruded over her lips frozen open in a smile, ^or wings flapped behind her arms. *When he reached for her neck she knew

28 that he would make love to her first ^and then slice off her head, #and that two sons would blossom up and out of her.

*Chrysaor, gold as the sun, leapt forth and then even more miraculously Pegasus, #a cordovan steed with silvery wings *flew out of her neck. ^Crying because her sons were more beautiful than she could have dreamt, she mourned the limits of her imagination.

#Perseus did not hear her because he was bridling his son. *But Medusa's voice reached the heavens, the way a sliver of ash escapes from a fire ând floats gently upwards. *Athena's ear caught the cooled remnant of sound and crafted a flute in memory of Medusa's gasp. #Then she picked up Medusa's head âs it rolled away from her body. *Athena dried and cured that head. She stitched it on her breastplate, #where it remained until torn and splattered with blood from so many battles, ît became invisible.

Memory is kept where you find it even if cloth, unlike myths, does not survive time.

*Between Greece and Thrace, Philomela wove Medusa's story in silent reverie. #As her threads raced forward and backward, her task blanketed her from the world. ^"She could also hate the same way she devoted herself to needlework."xxiii

*She wove another myth #another story ^on the other side of her robe.

*She wove a brown prow and three tiers of oars, #her journey on Tereus' ship ^and then her body remembered the swaying. She believed that she was a tree. She was Daphne. She shook or Apollo shook her.

#She wove a forest ^with a carpet of thyme and mint. #When a servant's hand ^your hand #accidentally brushed her arm , ^she felt herself to be bark, against which human touch was a scrape. #She was Daphne who became a tree ^when Apollo touched her. #She was a tree. Her skin was bark. ^She did not exist. #No mirror or sister would prove otherwise. ^She wept without sound. #Then she finished her tapestry as quickly as she began ^"and gently chased the memory from her mouth."xxiv

Philomela enters with Itys and servant following her.

ITYS Mama, come, come! Philomela wants to give the robe to you.

Procne enters.

PROCNE Sweet Philomela, though ill and silent, you have woven a gift for your sister.

ITYS Mama, unfold the robe. I want to see it!

PROCNE

30 The leaves on the border dance as though Boreas the North wind waves his hand.

ITYS The robe dances as though Boreas the North wind waves his hand.

PROCNE Philomela, this robe is haunted by an absent wind. It seems to move and shimmer as we speak.

ITYS There, mama, Philomela wove a circle. It's "the sun, loved by the horse-loving Thracians."xxv

PROCNE No, Itys, that circle is a mirror. A man carries it in his hand.

CHORUS OF SIRENS *A famous Greek hero carries the mirror. #Perseus! ^SHHH!

ITYS Who speaks from the sky?

PROCNE Sirens are nesting on our roof.

CHORUS OF SIRENS *We are girls #mortal girls ^winged girls. Sirens!

ITYS Girls, mortal girls, winged girls, Sirens.

31 Why are you on our roof?

CHORUS OF SIRENS We are resting on our long migration to our home in Sicily.

ITYS Have you seen Philomela's robe?

CHORUS OF SIRENS *We have seen many things. ^We know many things.

ITYS Then, who is the ugly monster with snakes in its hair?

CHORUS OF SIRENS *a famous creature named Medusa.

ITYS and the horse with silvery wings?

CHORUS OF SIRENS *Pegasus, Medusa's son.

ITYS Mama, look at how Pegasus flies out of Medusa.

CHORUS OF SIRENS #out of Medusa's neck ^after Perseus cut off her head. *SHHH!

PROCNE Once Perseus rode Pegasus through the sky and saved the princess Andromeda from an evil sea-monster.

ITYS Where, mama? I want to see. Is that the evil sea monster?

CHORUS OF SIRENS NO! Those are Medusa's two sisters. Gorgons with snaky hair ^and fangs in smiles. #SHHH!

PROCNE There is no sea monster or princess on this robe. That's another myth. But look at Athena.

ITYS Where? Where?

PROCNE There! Athena is bigger than Perseus because she is a goddess.

ITYS I see her! Athena plays a flute!

PROCNE Athena invented that flute, after she heard Medusa sing.

CHORUS OF SIRENS #cry ^when Perseus chopped off her head. *SHHH!

ITYS Mama, why does Perseus chop off Medusa's head?

PROCNE Look at how noble Perseus flies away on the back of Pegasus.

ITYS If Perseus can ride Pegasus through the sky, why does he have a ship too?

CHORUS OF SIRENS

33 *Philomela has woven another myth. #Another story ^fills the other side of her robe.

PROCNE A ship with a brown prow and three tiers of oars sails on the wine-colored sea.

ITYS That is a ship like father's ship!

PROCNE It sails to Greece for I see acanthus leaves on the shore.

ITYS It's a forest. A Greek forest with Greek leaves! It's your home. Your home with Philomela!!

PROCNE No, Itys. We lived in a marble palace, in a city. This is a forest...

CHORUS OF SIRENS #with a carpet of thyme and mint and two figures running. *^SHHH!

PROCNE This robe has so many tales it confuses the mind. And surely it is too rich for any body to wear. Itys, let the servant store this robe someplace safe.

ITYS No, mama, I want to see the other myth. Look! There are two people running in the woods.

34 PROCNE You are a fanciful interpreter of threads.

ITYS Mama, Philomela nods. She nods. There are two people running in the woods and one is a man is like Perseus. He carries a sickle.

CHORUS OF SIRENS #scimitar *Perseus carried a scimitar. Hermes, the god, gave it to him to chop off Medusa's head. #^SHHH!

ITYS This man carries a scimitar too. And he chases a girl in the forest.

PROCNE In a dark forest, shadows change the shapes of things and hide the truth.

CHORUS OF SIRENS A servant would know this story.

PROCNE A servant? Servants, like dark forests and myths, tell half-truths. A servant would not know this story.

CHORUS OF SIRENS A servant knows this story #the truth.

PROCNE A servant would not dare to speak this.

Servant departs.

ITYS Mama, I know this story!

35 Apollo the god chases Daphne the girl in a forest. When he touches her, she changes into a tree.

PROCNE No, Itys. This man can not be the god Apollo because he is no bigger than the other figures.

ITYS Then he is a famous Thracian hero because he wears Thracian robes!

PROCNE Thracian robes! Philomela, surely you did not mean to weave the story which now appears on the robe. Perhaps your threads, like your desire, strayed in your mind and made your shuttle tell a half-truth. Philomela! Philomela? Nod again. Afterall, a half-truth is whole lie!

CHORUS OF SIRENS We will be a chorus, a Greek chorus and offer a whole truth from a myth ^a tragedy.

Tharsay; legn talaythes ou sphalay pote. *Itys #Itys ^Itys Itys, "have no fear. If you speak the truth, you will never come to grief."xxvi

ITYS In a dark forest, I see.... a silver moon and a golden scimitar. A man and a girl run in a dark forest.

CHORUS OF SIRENS ^A Thracian man chases a Greek girl in a dark forest *#SHHH!

ITYS One is silver and one is gold, A Thracian man chases a Greek girl And then they roll, roll, roll.

PROCNE No! They do not roll. Nod Philomela. I beg you, nod. Say they do not roll.

ITYS Mama, they do roll, roll, roll. And then just like Perseus and Medusa, He takes out his scimitar and after they roll, roll, roll...

PROCNE SHHH!

ITYS he takes out his scimitar and he chops off the girl's head.

CHORUS OF SIRENS #the girl's tongue *only the tongue ^because she said she would make every rock #and every stone ^weep with her story until the earth herself cursed him.

ITYS SHHH! I will tell the myth to Mama. One is silver and one is gold A man and girl roll, roll, roll. He cuts off only her tongue with a scimitar and then he's done.

37 One is silver...

CHORUS OF SIRENS SHHH!

PROCNE Philomela, is this it? "Every time the autumn wind whistles through my hollow eyes, my hollow eyes, I want not to say it, but it is" my sister, a small girl with auburn hair and a quick smile who knew me once, whom I have but who cannot tell me all that we were and where we have been.

When Tereus sold trunks of our mother's life# plates, garments# I thought that there was no more he could take. But a barbarian honors no limits. My past receded as he beat his Thracian present into me.

Then your voice floated past my dreams. One dark word, Philomela. When your name became my breath, my chest filled with hope, and suddenly I remembered who I was, who we were...

"One dark word is all I am uttering you over and over in my heart. She may be a young girl tending her old father or she may be a young wife who walks the alleys of our youth."xxvii

I know a little girl whom I loved too much, too much, who filled water pitchers with song, and now will sing no more will sing no more.

38 ITYS One is silver and one is gold, a man and a girl roll, roll, roll.

PROCNE Does Itys speak while my sister remains silent? What do I need with crude Thracian tunes?

ITYS One is silver and one is gold, a man and a girl roll, roll, roll.

PROCNE One dark word is all I am.

Procne, Philomela, and Itys run off stage.

CHORUS OF SIRENS

^Once upon a time and long ago, Thetis, the shining goddess from the deep sea, was forced to marry Peleus, a mortal man.

^On their wedding night, Thetis accidenlty left one of her snaky scales in Peleus' leg. Peleus fell in love with that scale. But Thetis remained indifferent to things of the earth until she bore one son named Achilles, the greatest Greek warrior.

^Thetis cradled her sandy-haired son one late summer afternoon on a beach in Troy. Becoming her own salty tears, she turned into the sea once more, and crashed her prophecy on the lonely shore where Achilles listened before drifting into his brief future.

My son, mortal and foolish, you will die fighting under the burning walls of Troy, no matter how many of your tears I catch in my briny lap, in my briny lap. I cannot save you from the birth I gave you, not even if I were to turn you into a coral reef and keep you at my breast forever. Listen. Echoing with such sorrow, such divine sorrow, the ocean weeps upon the shore. Achilles, I am her. I am innocent of your birth and innocent of your death.

40 ACT III Nurse enters. NURSE A servant may only speak half-truths because their masters wish it so. But in the glowing light of Thrace, I have seen a crime I cannot speak and a truth I wish I did not know. Now, like you, Sirens, I have watched. But I have not sprouted wings. Rocks drip with blood and heated stones cradle a boy who sang his last good-night song to his mother. Condemned to have my feet plod on this damp moaning earth, I cry.

CHORUS OF SIRENS *You have seen so little #you ran out of the palace ^because you could not protect what you imagined you loved.

NURSE I loved a boy because he served his parents' vanity as I do. Now that boy has offered them a last gift. No. He did not offer. They took. I will say it because it is true. I will be bold.

Into the woman's quarter, without a sound, Procne and Philomela dragged Itys. Plotting their unspeakable deed, they covered his face. Unable to breathe, calling upon mother, father, and all the gods, to make the sun and air appear again, Itys began to sing a child's song such as I sang to him during cold winter nights when the howling wind frightened him.

When Procne could no longer endure

41 to hear his small voice grow smaller still, she pressed Philomela's robe down upon his face.

But the task was too simple, too easy for the boy barely struggled and was quickly silent. Procne frantically began clawing at the robe as if she still might find Itys singing underneath. But when she finally lifted all the folds of cloth, Itys' body lay there limp, his lips no longer moving. Then she spread out the tapestry and traced its strange stories with her finger, all the while staring at Itys.

Quietly and then more loudly she began to cry. Philomela approached and held Procne's face between her hands and slowly opened her mouth as if to speak. But she could only gurgle out a dull noise. Procne screamed. They looked at the robe and at Itys. Then, like Furies, they carried him to the hearth and threw his limp body on the fire. What happened there I did not see for I came out to find the light and air Itys sought.

CHORUS OF SIRENS A servant weighed down with hearth stones and tales will fall to the ground. Still, the story you tell echoes with the footsteps of justice.

NURSE Justice? It is not just to darken innocent eyes.

CHORUS OF SIRENS *Innocent eyes #Thracian eyes ^male eyes *could never be trusted to see #to hear the cries of a small animal in the forest, ^in his house.

NURSE Itys is a child. He is not Tereus.

CHORUS OF SIRENS A boy child will be a man-child. Itys will become Tereus in time and in time commit unspeakable wrongs.

NURSE Itys was innocent. "[Tereus was] mad. But they acted still more madly in punishing him by violence. Any mortal who is infuriated by his wrongs, and applies a medicine that is worse than the disease is a doctor who does not understand the trouble."xxviii

CHORUS OF SIRENS A search for a cure did not lead Procne and Philomela into the cooking room, #to the hearth in cooking room. ^The "yoke of compulsion that enslaves"xxix #like a wayward human heart *struggling to breathe justly ^drove them.

Now we Sirens who know all stories will sing the names of Procne and Philomela alongside of the names of famous Greek heroes.

NURSE What is a name laced with time compared to a child? And who will sing the name of innocent Itys?

CHORUS OF SIRENS #We do not need to carry the name of Itys in our wings. We will not carry the name of Tereus. Look, he returns, ^emptied and drained from his self-appointed task.

43 Tereus strides on stage. TEREUS I slay my brother for this silence? Where is the treasure of my house, Itys? Why is this table more empty than my wedding bed?

NURSE Your wife, Procne, approaches.

Procne and Philomela enter.

PROCNE You return, Tereus, you return.

TEREUS Yes, ask me how I fared.

PROCNE I know you tried to trade Dryas' life for Itys' life.

TEREUS The gods demanded this exchange.

PROCNE The gods speak in riddles. Dryas did nothing.

TEREUS You know that Dryas planned nothing.

PROCNE I know he planned a feast for my sister.

TEREUS My brother planned to eat me blind.

PROCNE Your brother planned a feast for my sister, my sister.

44 TEREUS The prophet spoke in Greek, as if the Gods themselves favored Hellenes. Yet, Tereus the Thracian understood "the one who feeds you eats you." As I drove my sword into my brother's liver I wept over the day I set foot on Greek land and saw two girls with slender olive necks bathing in a cove and chattering in the Greek tongue. Every night you dreamt, you dreamt in Greek. When I would hear you cry out, speak in Greek I would picture those two girls shining in water, talking, talking.

I remember your ignorance of our language and believed your silence innocent. As years passed your silence became a habit that comforted you as it harmed me. You stopped, stopped talking in your dreams and in our house.

I lived in your silence. You could say I learned how to interpret Greek. You could say I learned the virtue of a Greek woman's silence.

PROCNE No, you have not truly learned the virtue of a Greek woman's silence. Take for example, the silence of Philomela. I do not think you fully appreciate her virtuous silence.

TEREUS I take nothing for which I have not fairly traded.

PROCNE What did you trade, Tereus?

TEREUS

45 I traded your disdain for my pleasure.

PROCNE My disdain then.

TEREUS Your silence. Do you not recognize yourself in your precious Philomela

PROCNE I recognize#

TEREUS who serves you the silence you delighted in serving me.

PROCNE I do not think I have ever delighted in serving you.

TEREUS Fear not, you never served well.

PROCNE Then my silence should have pleased you, even if you believed otherwise. But why rehearse the past and imagine the gods' will, when the future they grant us is so rich. A feast, Tereus, I have prepared for you. A thanks-offering for Philomela's arrival and for the holy voice you heard on your voyage home. I could wish to have heard it myself. And sometimes I think I did. Here at last your feast, the rich desert of all your efforts. Nurse, serve your master this meal which Philomela carries so gracefully in her small hands.

NURSE Though destined to serve, I beg you do not command me to serve this.

46 Nurse staring forward backs into house.

PROCNE I have been inspired, not unlike your Greek prophet, Tereus. Yes, I have been filled with a divine spirit and have sacrificed to bring you this meal which rightly should be served by me.

TEREUS Your words are not inspired.

PROCNE Yet this is. Does it not please you?

TEREUS A plate of luxuries almost too rich to eat.

Tereus begins to eat PROCNE Nonsense. A man's great pleasure is to feel such delicacies melt on his tongue. I could long for such a pleasure.

TEREUS Then join me in the celebratory feast you have so kindly prepared.

PROCNE Yet, how could I, Tereus?

TEREUS I see no reason why you could not.

PROCNE Tereus, my appetite flew away with my tongue.

TEREUS You speak. You speak nonsense.

PROCNE

47 Nonsense. My appetite flew away with my tongue. I no longer taste life.

TEREUS Your words make no sense. You very well have...everything.

PROCNE Tereus, why do you force me to remember?

TEREUS What could you remember?

PROCNE I could remember how the moon shimmered one night in a Greek forest. I dreamt of seeing my sister. Do you not remember?

TEREUS I do not remember anything.

PROCNE Tereus, brother-in-law, protector in chief, do you not remember the shadow you cast on that moon-filled night?

TEREUS You can not know about what you speak.

PROCNE I remember your shadow in moonlight.

TEREUS You cannot.

PROCNE I remember the smell of thyme and mint and the sound of breaking branches. You imagined that if you robbed me of my tongue,

48 you would rob me of my voice.

TEREUS I did not steal your tongue.

PROCNE I would not say that you stole my tongue. Nonetheless, I ask that you return it, so that if only for a brief moment I might taste such a rich feast.

TEREUS I made a poor deal indeed. I should have kept what I left and left what I kept.

PROCNE Even so, you would not be able to keep me, or my witnesses, the trees and stones, silent.

TEREUS You are Procne, not Philomela, though easily I could make you as silent as Philomela. Easily I could take your voice.

PROCNE Have you not learned that a woman has many voices? A voice for her father, a cooing for her child, tearful notes upon a funeral pyre, a song of her mother, and then too a "voice of the shuttle."xxx

TEREUS From you I could take them all.

PROCNE

49 Never having heard any of them, Tereus, I have confidence you could not find them.

TEREUS Your confidence will find its rightful punishment.

PROCNE A rightful punishment is what I planned for you.

TEREUS And now you claim to be Nemesis herself, Grim goddess hated by all? as well as pathetic sputtering Philomela?

PROCNE Do not shame my sister as you have shamed me.

TEREUS Shame. Shame is a Greek woman.

PROCNE Shame is a woman, invisible to all who see her but know nothing nothing of her life and imagine wife mother daughter sister have meaning. To be once and for all and then no more, to have no reflection in time's blinding trajectory. Then I would suit you well. Yet I could aspire to more.

TEREUS More? No doubt. Only your womb has been frugal, content with having bore only one son. My son. Bring me my house's treasure, my son, Itys,

50 so that he may dine with me.

PROCNE Your son? your treasure? ha!

TEREUS Bring me my Thracian son!

PROCNE Sun. Yes, I remember how your gold-plated robe shone that night.

TEREUS My son.

PROCNE He has flown away.

TEREUS Itys?

PROCNE Itys has flown away.

TEREUS Woman, I do not like your words.

PROCNE Theseus forgot Ariadne on Naxos. And Bacchus turned her into a star. He is she. Itys has flown into the sky. Itys is a star.

TEREUS Itys? my Itys? a star? no longer a living boy? I shall make you more silent than Philomela and glut myself on revenge for this deed of yours.

PROCNE You have already glutted yourself on my revenge.

TEREUS This luxurious plate of food? your revenge? Poison? You would destroy me too and in a womanly way?

PROCNE Tereus, you imagine so little. Poison would be a kindness, womanly or not. I have served you your moment of hope, your Thracian treasure, on this very platter, so that you may consume once and for all the hope you have stolen from me.

What you taste I enjoy in my tongueless mouth and taste no more. The one who feeds you#

TEREUS #NO#

PROCNE eats you blind.

CHORUS OF SIRENS We never left Persephone when Hades took her from Sicily to the Underworld. Hades made Persephone queen of the dead, such a vast kingdom teeming with memories. Having sprouted wings, we followed her there. We sing to all souls who enter the realm of Persephone. Our songs blanket the bitterness of death with pity.

With pity the gods looked upon Procne and Philomela and Tereus. When the gods cradled all three in a divine sigh high above Thrace,

52 Procne, Philomela and Tereus shed their human form.

The gods turned Tereus into "the hoopoe who is fascinated by his suffering. The gods decorated his wings with stripes and made him preen aggressively and dwell among rocks. He barters only with himself now. When spring appears, he has gray wings. But when fall arrives and wheat is on the threshing floors, he trades his gray feathers for stripes. Yet always filled with hate and discontent, the hoopoe exchanges such homey places for lonely woods and rocky crags.xxxi

Philomela never desired to leave her home. In Thrace, "as she was hurrying herself and in a coloured robe"xxxii she was not trying to tell a story. She was building a nest of threads for herself like a bird who turns round and round and shapes its materials with its breast so that its home is its very person... [even] its suffering."xxxiii Philomela became the swallow who haunts cities and houses, not woods, and builds its nest with only mud and its own saliva.

Procne became the nightingale, who sings the sweetest, yet most mournful song on trembling branches.

One night you will hear her and you will remember who you were and no longer are. You will remember one dark word# all she can say now# Itys Itys Itys.

iSophocles Fragment 587. Translation mine. Thirteen fragments containing roughly fifty-seven lines of Sophocles' tragedy "Tereus" survive. These fragments (in Greek and English) may

53 be found in Sophocles III: Fragments. 1996. Edited and translated by Hugh Lloyd-Jones. Cambridge MA. iiMaria Laina, "Hers" in The Rehearsal of Misunderstanding: Three Collections by Contemporary Greek Women Poets. 1998. Edited, translated and with an introduction by Karen VanDyck. Hanover and London. Maria Laina, "Hers" in Misunderstanding, page 193. iiiSophocles Fragment 583. Translation mine. ivSophocles Fragment 583. Lloyd-Jones' translation with "drafty and poor" replacing "opprobrious." vSophocles Fragment 585. Lloyd-Jones' translation. viSophocles Fragment 584. Lloyd-Jones' translation. viiSophocles Fragment 591. Lloyd-Jones' translation. viiiLaina, Maria, 1998, "Hers" in Misunderstanding, page 167. ixTerasaki , Etsuko. 2002. Figures of Desire: Wordplay, Spirit Possession, Fantasy, Madness, and Mourning in Japanese Noh Plays.Michigan. These lines are from "Kayoi Komachi" a Noh drama that is quoted and discussed on page 155. x Terasaki, 2002, 91. These lines are from "Sotoba Komachi." xiMaria Laina, 1998, "Hers" in Misunderstanding, page 173. xiiTerasaki, 2002, 150. These lines are from "Kayoi Komachi." xiiiSappho, poem 49, in Sappho: Poems and Fragments. 2001.Translated by Stanley Lombardo. Indianapolis . I have slightly adapted and shortened Lombardo's translation. xivSappho, poem 11, in Sappho: Poems and Fragments. I have slightly adapted and shortened Lombardo's translation. xvSophocles Fragment 592. Translation mine. xviFrom Harrison Birtwistle's opera, "The Mask of Orpheus" xviiSophocles Fragment 593. Translation mine. xviiiOvid Book 5. 427-38, from Ovid: Metamorphoses. 1960. Translated by Horace Gregory. New York. xixSophocles Fragment 590. Lloyd-Jones' translation. xxMaria Laina, 1998. "Hers" in Misunderstanding, page 215. xxiMaria Laina, 1998. "Hers" in Misunderstanding, page 163. xxiiMaria Laina, 1998. "Hers" in Misunderstanding, page 183. xxiiiMaria Laina, 1998. "Hers" in Misunderstanding, page 159. xxivMaria Laina, 1998. "Hers" in Misunderstanding, page 257. xxvSophocles Fragment 582. Translation mine. xxviSophocles Fragment 588. Lloyd Jones' translation . xxviiParaphrases from "Born Again" by Forugh Farrokhzad, translated by Jascha Kessler with Amin Banani in Women Poets. 1985. Edited by Carol Cosman, Joan Keefe, and Kathleen Weaver. New York. xxviiiSophocles Fragment 589. Lloyd-Jones' translation. xxixA line from Sophocles Fragment 591. Lloyd-Jones' translation. xxxAristotle, Poetics 1454b36. xxxiSophocles' Fragment 581. Translation mine. xxxiiSophocles' Fragment 586. Lloyd-Jones' translation. xxxiiiBachelard, Gaston. 1964. The Poetics of Space. Translated by Maria Jolas. New York. I have greatly modified a quote from Jules Michelet on page 100.