Sophocles, Trachiniae
Robert Torrance, Ed.

     Come now, approach and stand beside your father;
behold how I have suffered from my hardships.
For I will lift this covering and show you.
There, look! You all may see my mangled frame
1080and know how poor and pitiful I am.
Ah ah! the pain! ah ah!
Once more I feel the burning pangs convulse me,
piercing my side; I must again contend
with this unmerciful, devouring illness.
Prince Hades, take me;
come, lightning, strike me!
O Zeus, my father, hurl the thunderbolt
down on me! Yet again the plague consumes me,
blazing in fury. O my hands, my hands,
1090my back, my chest, and O my own dear arms,
you are the same as in the past, when you
vanquished and slew the Lion of Nemea,
the scourge of herdsmen, creature none approached
or spoke to, and brought low Lernaean Hydra;
you checked the savage tribe of beasts, half horse,
half man, the lawless, mighty, violent Centaurs,
subdued the Erymanthian Boar, and tamed
Hades' invincible three-headed Dog,
the Serpent's child, and killed the Dragon guarding
1100the golden apples at the ends of earth.
Countless have been the labors I endured,
and none has ever triumphed over me.
But now, my limbs disjointed, torn to shreds,
I lie here vanquished by an unseen ruin -
I whom they say a noble mother bore,
I who am called the son of starry Zeus.
     And yet, be sure of this: though I am nothing,
and cannot move a step, yet I will punish
her who has done this deed. Let her but come:
1110she will discover and proclaim that I
in death, as in my life, destroyed the wicked.