Cupid and Psyche
Page 9
Where the heart of Psyche lies? I’ll eat it.
And be made whole at last.
(A sound. ADONIS withdraws as LIVIA and DAREIA enter. CUPID disguises himself as the female Oracle.)
LIVIA.
O Dareia! I faint.
DAREIA.
Now Livia, be strong. We come before thee, Oracle, as supplicants.
CUPID.
(Singing.) A hop and a skip
To my lady’s bed
Apollo will be calling!
LIVIA.
She seems to me most like the Beast. What does she sing? It chills me.
CUPID.
(Singing.) For all the gods
Will soon be dead
And all the angels falling!
LIVIA.
O Dareia! I will not love. But let us go!
CUPID.
No, stay! No Beast am I. What would you?
LIVIA.
We long to love!
DAREIA.
We long to have the curse relieved.
LIVIA.
We long to know who cast the curse.
DAREIA.
And how it might be lifted.
CUPID.
What will you give me in return?
LIVIA.
We brought nothing but ourselves.
DAREIA.
And all we do possess. Gold in coin and chain, in earrings, bracelets, torques and rings. We lay them at your feet.
CUPID.
I do not want these things. I would sooner take a lock of your burnished hair than these bands of worthless gold.
DAREIA.
A lock of my sister’s hair? Nay! Give me some shears and I will strike her head from off her body! So you will tell us Psyche is accurst.
CUPID.
Would you kill for knowledge?
DAREIA.
Yes, yes, I would!
LIVIA.
My sister is too eager. She would not kill.
DAREIA.
To lift the curse of Love, I would kill Love. Give me a dagger in my hand, and I would carve out my initials in the heart of anyone you please. Yea, even Psyche.
CUPID.
You are Psyche’s sisters.
LIVIA.
O, say not you love her, too!
CUPID.
I hear she is unwell. I hear she grieves for these strange and sudden deaths. Does she grieve? Will she relent?
LIVIA.
Why should Psyche grieve, so long as she is comfortable?
CUPID.
Then—all these deaths have been in vain? Her heart’s still made of stone?
LIVIA.
If she has a heart of flesh, she’s hidden it away, within our Father’s breast.
CUPID.
Your Father, you say? Old Thanos.
LIVIA.
Aye.
CUPID.
I would have Psyche’s summer heart for mine. But I would not have you kill her—no. What good the sacrifice of one you hate? Give me the youthful heart of one you love.
DAREIA.
What shall we do? For there are none we love.
CUPID.
Do you not love your father?
LIVIA.
But he is old—
DAREIA.
(To LIVIA:) That nothing matters. So as this lichen crone will with an answer satisfy. (To CUPID:) Our father, you say? You would have our father’s heart?
CUPID.
This night.
DAREIA.
And tell us how to lift the curse?
CUPID.
This night, I will. So this night Thanos dies.
DAREIA.
It will be done.
LIVIA.
I like it not.
DAREIA.
Enough.
CUPID.
So be it then. And for this work tonight I’ll tell you this: if you will do this thing be assured the Beast will no more trouble ye. Will you be gone?
DAREIA.
This very moment, aye. Come, sister, let us kill in Passion’s name. We will return tonight.
(DAREIA and LIVIA exeunt, as ADONIS creeps back on.)
CUPID.
Or sooner still.
For yawning Death upon the back of Time
Will swiftly gallop Thanos to his grave.
And from her father’s arms I’ll pluck my bride.
I have no doubt of this. The hour strikes.
Four months have passed. O, heed the warning bell.
Tonight will desperate Psyche come to me,
Although it make my Heaven, Hell.
Act III, Scene 4
(THANOS and PSYCHE enter. CUPID steals a kiss as PSYCHE passes by.)
THANOS.
Psyche?
PSYCHE.
Nothing, father. The wind.
THANOS.
No wind;
The stout door’s barred, the windows shuttered tight –
No wind, sweet daughter, can capture thee tonight.
Where is he?
PSYCHE.
Gone.
THANOS.
Sure?
PSYCHE.
I know his voice. We’re safe.
THANOS.
Safe? From love? That is no safety, daughter; but a death.
PSYCHE.
Speak not that word.
THANOS.
Speak not of Love?
PSYCHE.
Speak not of Death. My breath is full of it.
I cannot move for corpses, like mangled birds
A tyger-cat might toss upon my pillow.
(CUPID whistles, stroking ADONIS’ hair, as PERSEPHONE glides on.)
PSYCHE.
He summons me. (Aloud) I will not come!
(The gods chuckle.)
THANOS.
I thought we were alone.
PSYCHE.
(Overlapping) There is no hiding here….
THANOS.
Nor living here, not whiles—
PSYCHE.
(Overlapping) He haunts me, still. (Aloud) I’ll none!
You cannot fright me with your deaths!
THANOS.
He may not mean to fright you.
PSYCHE.
No? Kill me then.
THANOS.
Not that. He’s broken more than corset bones
In search of women’s hearts. He’ll break you, too.
PSYCHE.
I will not bend. Nor lie upon my back!
I’ll throw myself from off the perilous cliff
Before I will this bloody monster wed.
THANOS.
He may not be a monster when you take him to your bed.
(PSYCHE looks at THANOS incredulously.)
THANOS.
Humour your old father, Psyche. All dreams
Seem hopeless when the sickly moon holds sway.
Sleep, child.
PSYCHE.
I cannot sleep. What else, then?
THANOS.
Pray.
PSYCHE.
To whom? The gods I know are mad.
THANOS.
Even so,
There may be other gods you do not know.
PSYCHE.
O, Father—I’ll kneel to thee. Counsel me, I pray.
THANOS.
Then sorrow a little. Bend a little. Sway.
In this cracked and brittle world there’s nothing perfect,
But it’s scarred.
(DAREIA and LIVIA sneak on, unseen.)
DAREIA.
See how our father sweet embraces her!
Now Livia, strike true.
LIVIA.
I cannot murder
My own father! Dareia, you do it.
You have a change purse in your hollow soul.
Take you the knife.
DAREIA.
Who I! Who have a babe
Beneath my breast? A mother must not murder.
But thou art barren. Take thee the bloody knife.
Now, now! Before he sees us.
LIVIA.
We agreed
That we loved none. Then why should this be difficult?
I’ll do’t.
DAREIA.
Now!
LIVIA.
I’ll do’t when he’s sleeping.
Do not make me look him in the eye.
O Dareia, if he smiles I am lost!
DAREIA.
He’s not smiling now, but strokes our sister’s hair,
And bends to kiss her brow as though he knew
What malice lies within our troubled hearts—
I cannot do this, sister.
LIVIA.
Nor can I.
This office is neither a mother’s nor a maiden’s.
DAREIA.
Aye, it were better done by foreign hands.
LIVIA.
A man might do it.
DAREIA.
What man could claim to love
Our father as well as any daughter could?
LIVIA.
How strange to find we love our father.
DAREIA.
But do ourselves love more. Give me the knife.
LIVIA.
What will you do? You will not murder him!
DAREIA.
I’ll do what must be done. The Oracle decreed.
What’s one more death in times of dire need?
He’s old. ‘Twill be a mercy. Give me the knife.
Or do you long for loveless life? For love
Of him you claim to love, for Brontes’ sake,
For the sake of she who died today,
For the sake of those who’ll die hereafter,
Give me the knife!
LIVIA.
It is much against my will.
DAREIA.
Be quiet! I’ll make quick work of him
While you will Psyche draw away lest she
Raise up the clamour of our foul deed;
And with her voice dig three graves: for you,
For me, and for my child yet unborn.
Go. Let us be quickly done and silent.
LIVIA.
As the grave.
(LIVIA approaches PSYCHE and THANOS.)
THANOS.
How now, Livia? What word from the Oracle?
PSYCHE.
Am I to blame?
LIVIA.
She would not say outright.
But she did say there would be one more death
Before the curse was lifted.
PSYCHE.
One death more…. Did she say whose?
LIVIA.
She did.
PSYCHE.
My own?
LIVIA.
Another’s.
PSYCHE.
One I know?
LIVIA.
Quite well.
Come, sister, I will tell you all she said—
Elsewhere. Our father has his woes enough
And will have more enough without a foolish
Woman’s prophecy. Will you away?
PSYCHE.
That which might be said might be heard by all.
THANOS.
Where is your sister, Livia? Where is Dareia?
LIVIA.
She’ll come to thee. If thou wilt patient be.
Good father, how I love thee!
(LIVIA kisses THANOS cheek, throwing her arms around his neck.)
THANOS.
Why, Livia, are you trembli—
(DAREIA enters, thrusting the dagger into THANOS’ back. For a moment, the scene is almost domestic: two daughters embracing their father. Until they step away, and THANOS falls to his knees.)
THANOS.
I see.
(CUPID steps forward, stopping PERSEPHONE.)
THANOS.
I see thee, sir, now that the veil is torn.
In truth, sir, I thought you would be taller.
Psyche—
PSYCHE.
What have you done? What have you done?
THANOS.
Psyche, I must leave thee for a little.
I loved thee best. I gladly say it, although
It send my soul to Hell. (Seeing PERSEPHONE.) Here she is now.
I think, lady, you came once for my daughter?
PERSEPHONE.
I come for you tonight. Another bargain
Has been struck it seems. Do you fear me, man?
THANOS.
No. For you only take my body.
(PERSEPHONE touches him. THANOS dies.)
LIVIA.
This—was a mistake.
CUPID.
Why, cousin, do you smile?
PERSEPHONE.
You’ve lost her, Love.
CUPID.
I cannot lose what’s not yet mine.
PERSEPHONE.
Nor win it
When she’s unwilling to be won. Will rape her,
Cupid? As once you held me still while Hades
Ravished me?
CUPID.
I’ll have her.
PERSEPHONE.
Aye. But at what cost?
I hate my husband, Cupid. Remember that.
(PERSEPHONE withdraws with ADONIS.)
LIVIA.
I cannot close his eyes.
PSYCHE.
Let me.
DAREIA.
‘Tis done.
I did it. Cannot be undone. We are free.
LIVIA.
Why does he stare?
DAREIA.
We are free.
LIVIA.
What does he see?!
Sew up his eyes! Lock them shut! Gouge them out!
PSYCHE.
You will not touch him! Murderers, who veil
Yourself in sisterly flesh—no flesh of mine,
No human flesh—could do what you have done.
LIVIA.
Remember, Psyche, I did not hold the knife…
PSYCHE.
No. You held our father.
DAREIA.
We did what you could not.
LIVIA.
The Oracle asked for Thanos’ heart—
PSYCHE.
Did she? How did this Oracle look?
Was there something of the Beast in her?
I’ll tell you now, there was. I know this hand.
Have felt it press upon me while I sleep.
(Aloud.) You will not touch his body…if you’ll have mine.
DAREIA.
What’s that?
PSYCHE.
He wants my heart. Then take it.
LIVIA.
She has gone mad.
PSYCHE.
O, never saner! At last,
I know me for who I am: Persephone’s usurped!
I’ll be the bride of Hell—and gladly, too.
I call thee, Lover! I name thee, Love-in-Death!
What? Whither away? I’d have you for my bridesmaids!
LIVIA.
I will not stay! There are too many eyes
That look on us and know what we have done.
Come, Dareia. (To the audience.) I’ll not be judged by you!
(LIVIA exits, but DAREIA hesitates. To PSYCHE:)
DAREIA.
You’ll marry him?
PSYCHE.
I’ll claim him as my own.
Myself a monster, too. I’ll bed him; tame him;
Suck up his poison juices, and spit them in his face.
I’ll marry him—to rid the world of Love.
Will you not thank me for my pains? Or kiss me,
And wish me well?
DAREIA.
This love will kill you, Psyche.
PSYCHE.
And would you stop him?
DAREIA.
No.
(DAREIA exits. After a moment, PSYCHE speaks:)
PSYCHE.
Come forth, my lover! Come now and claim thy bride!
Come forth, O Love! Come now, O Love-in-Death,
Come show thyself, if thou art not afeared
Of a mortal’s rightful wrath!
He does not speak. I’ll draw him forth to me,
Or die in the attempt.
(She puts the dagger to her breast. From behind, CUPID grabs her wrists.)
CUPID.
Thou knowest my voice.
PSYCHE.
As well as my own grave.
CUPID.
And wouldst be mine?
PSYCHE.
Against my will yet by it.
CUPID.
Nor give thy heart to any other man?
PSYCHE.
Nor give my body; my heart’s my own.
CUPID.
I would have more.
PSYCHE.
Thou hast my word, be happy. I would have thine.
CUPID.
Thou hast my hateful heart.