Prometheus

Hello. Prometheus was the immortal who in Greek myth stole fire from the gods and gave it to his favourite mortal, humans. His name means 'forethought' and fire was often used as a symbol for thought and knowledge. Zeus, king of the gods, punished Prometheus for this by chaining him to a rock in the Caucasus. He also punished humanity by sending them a woman called Pandora ('all gifts') and  a box. Pandora, a curious person by nature was instructed not to open the box. She could not resist, of course. When she opened the box a great stream of plagues and sufferings and whatnot streamed out of the box to bedevil humanity.
I have written a thing inspired by this myth which I think I thought I'd share with you. It is a chained Prometheus addressing an exultant Zeus and it goes thusly:

PROMETHEUS

They were cold. They were frightened, flinching at half-seen phantasms in the dark. They were left wanting for even the most basic of necessities; left wanting by you, the all-powerful Father. Abandoned. Wretched. Hopeless. Forgotten in the dust by you whom they had been taught would protect them. By you whom they had been taught to love. By you whom they had been taught only became wroth with them when they deserved it. They believed themselves to be less than they were; to be children, subjects to the inscrutable will of the Father, slaves to the whims of the master. They were sad, scared, pathetic creatures, these humans. I heard them crying out and it wrenched my heart. I heard them say:

“Please, Father! I’m hungry!”

“Please, Father! I hurt and I don’t know why!”

“Please, Father! Some curse has fallen upon me! I’m weak, and I’m dying and I’m scared!”

I heard this. Night after night I heard this. I heard the panic, the wailing, the sobbing of these broken-hearted children. I heard it echoing off the sky until the very stars wept at their inability to help. I heard it, and I know you heard it – how could you not? You heard it and you did nothing. Nothing! You left them in their futile misery because “their nature makes them unsuitable for anything more!”

I pitied them in their pointless, helpless plight. How could you not? How could you hear their pleas and see their terror at a world not their own and not do everything in your power to soften their hardship? How could anyone refuse to give them a little bit of warmth and light?

You did, though.

So I gave them a spark, a few embers to distract them from their fears and how they marvelled. How they laughed to see that these demons they feared were nothing more than branches flailing in the wind. They fed the fire and it fed them and they started to stand a little taller.

Those few inches brought them too close to you, though, didn’t they? Too close to Olympos’ lofty heights. Secure in your storm-walled fortress you saw those scant few inches as an unacceptable threat to your power. Uppity servants need to be put in their place, don’t they? They need to be made small so they don’t think they have the power to rise further than the walls of their confines. You had them in their cage for a reason, after all. They weren’t good enough to try their hand at all the joys beyond the four walls you so thoughtfully put around them for their own safety.

You, o most myopic of deities, not only could you not see the wonders this little lump of liberty would make possible, but you actually punished them for daring to reach for it!

Did you really think, foul and impotent godling, that she would be a punishment? Did you really think she, this daughter of my heart, imbued with the self-same curiosity and kindness that saturates my own ichor, would be a burden to these mortals? She is a rock on which they can stand tall, a rocket to launch them to such heights that your Olympos will seem a squalid anthill.

Send your plagues, she will cure them. Have your wars to thin the ranks of men, she and those like her will compose epics on the joys of coming home. Sow your jealousy amongst their hearts; she will drive her race to seek pure and everlasting joys. She will light such fires in the hearts of mortals that the fear on which you depend for your power will soon be nought but ash, a poorly-remembered childhood nightmare.

So rattle the clouds with thunder, scrawl threats across the sky with lightning-charged ink howl with rage from your little throne; it will do you no good. My inquiring daughter will give them all the gifts you denied them. She will forge for them all the tools you feared they might wield. She will lead them to wonders that you in your arrogant ignorance never dreamed possible. She will end your loathsome reign.

One hopes you're well,
yrs,
ADWoodward

The Song of the Fallen Queen

Hello. Terribly sorry I've not put anything up here for a little while; I was in the Caribbean. It was a lovely holiday, but this post has nothing to do with that. I thought I'd share with you another thing that was the basis for song lyrics for the play what I was in. this one is based on Euripides' Hecuba. It goes thusly:

The Song of the Fallen Queen

She is a mother and instinct is mighty;

It drove her in her offspring’s best interest,

Like the she-bear with her mountain-side rages.

When one’s child is threatened one’s brain disengages;

No logic, no calm analysis.

Pure action, driven by fear of paralysis.

Doing nothing has grave consequences

For her and her bundle of joy.

When her daughter or her little boy

Needs her she’ll pay no heed to logic,

Or safety, or the binding decorum of man-made laws.

For she knows the high price of the slightest pause:

The life of a child,

Her child.

Not moving, nor smiling, nor screaming, or crying

But still.

Dreadfully still.

And cold.

But if maternal instinct fails her

There’s one thought left to save her:

Punish the infanticide.

That might still the screams inside.

The heart-piercing note of a terrified child

Begging the feminine sentinel to appear

And say “It’s okay now, don’t cry, mummy’s here”

And make the hurting stop

And make them go away

And make everything alright again.

But it won’t ever be alright again.

She’ll never hold her child again.

And that is why she hurt the men

Who tore out her still-beating heart.

Foolish in naïveté

She believed them when they promised sweetly

That they would look after her child,

That they would stand in loco parentis,

And stand guard after her farewell kiss.

But they didn’t.

And now the rage has faded,

And her battle-lust is sated,

She stands by a photograph

Of an eight-year child old caught mid-laugh

And she knows –

More than anything she’s known before or since

That despite her just and cunning revenge

It will never be alright again.

One hopes you're well,
yrs,
ADWoodward

The Song of the Silent Prophet

Hello. Tonight is the last night of the play what I'm in; it's in The Courtyard Theatre, Shoreditch, and I'm sure you can still buy tickets on the door if you particularly want. The play tries (valiantly, I think) to make a feminist point and this poem is the basis of the lyrics to the last song of the play and tries to drive home said point. The myth on which the poem is based is that of Apollo and Cassandra and I'd like to share it with you. It goes thusly:

The Song of the Silent Prophet

Women, as I’m sure you know by now, are objects;

Objects to be bought and traded, pawed at and paraded,

Loaned and hired and at their most ideal, objects of desire.

Women have no voice – why would they need one?

They only need to stay where they’re put and when they’re called, to come.

One such object, a princess of Troy was put in a temple as decoration,

An ornament for mighty Apollo’s sordid delectation.

The petulant god wanted more than just to see her

He needed to own her – it was his right he was owed this prize

She got no say – why would she want one?

She should be honoured to have been chosen.

When she said yes, as doubtless she would,

He’d gift her with unseen sight -

A prize he knew she’d like.

Gods have very good taste.

But in his haste he failed to see

That his charms were not as sweet as he believed

And she said no.

To a god.

To a man.

And in his pique he sought to wreak

A terrible curse to bind her to tragedy

To put her in her place.

He took the gift and twisted it, made it grotesque;

Prophetic joys still filled her mind

But in place of hope-filled ecstasies

Her mind recoiled from haunting shades

There was no respite – why should she get one?

She tried to warn her kith and kin of all the nightmares she had seen

But they mocked her and ignored her and said her daydreams bored them.

Apollo in his gleeful spite had hid her truth from others’ sight

Until her own doom loomed before her

Not one man would heed her warnings.

He needn’t have bothered;

What sane man would have listened to her?

To a woman?

To a slave?

To an object?

One hopes you're well,
yours,
ADWoodward

The Ballad of Clytemnestra

Hello. At the moment I am in a very interesting play. It's about a son trying to free himself from the attentions of the furies - spirits of vengeance - who are haunting him because he killed his mother because she killed his father killed their daughter. Also the daughter kills the wife's new lover, but that's okay because no one likes him. It's on 7th, 8th & 9th of July at the courtyard theatre and if you'd like you can buy tickets for it here: http://www.thecourtyard.org.uk/whatson/261/the-women-screaming-beyond. I wouldn't be so vulgar as to use the sacred space of my blog just to be a commercial whore. I do have a thing for you to read as well. The play uses songs to do what choral odes did in Greek tragedy. I wrote poems which, with a little bit of tweaking by people who actually know something about music, became the lyrics for these songs. I would like to share one of these with you. This one is the ghost of the mother exhorting the furies to do their job and it goes thusly:

The Ballad of Clytemnestra

Hello there, Furies, how are you? I’ve been trapped down in the gloom

But I thought I’d come and ask you why - despite the solemn task that I

Gave you when I made you from rage and hatred -

Why is my son still breathing?

I wondered what was keeping you

And now I find you sleeping, you

Useless, idle twerps.

Don’t you know how I suffer?

But it’s not enough for you to just delay

No! You have to while away the day

While that matricidal little shit

Of a son of mine commits

His crime and spends his time

Changing the wallpaper in MY throne room

While I’m stuck, as I said, down in Hades’ gloom

Being snidely mocked by the shades of mediocre cocks.

So I thought I’d tell you

Why I swiftly sent you

To give me some peace at last.

I won’t let that weapon-wielding arse,

Agamemnon be vindicated in infanticide

Or let the git decide to put his brother’s wife before his own.

You lay there with your dreaming

When you should turn your minds to scheming

On how to give me one thing at which I won.

From the outset I was second-best

Like when Zeus came down to test

His pimping skills on our mother

And the Olympian begat

Another squalling brat

Whose life was heaven-blessed

While I, of mortal seed, was left

In Helen’s whorish shadow.

Every king and every prince of every place in Greece

Wanted her to have a piece

Of them inside of her

And maybe make a bride of her.

I was second-prize.

So just for once in my wretched life

Can’t things turn out as I wanted?

I want Orestes to be haunted

But you just had to have a nap!

I will not take this crap!

So stand up, get in line!

You’re my furies! Mine!

It was my rage that called you back

From slumber underneath the earth

My screams that gave you birth

And still I find you snoring!

You lazy, useless, slothful, toothless,

Awful, hopeless, gruesome, loathsome

Pathetic excuses for a spirit of vengeance,

I demand you find my son and make him pay

But most of all I’d like to say:

WAKE UP, YOU IDLE FUCKING CUNTS!

One hopes you're well,
yrs,
ADWoodward