 | Julia Domna |  |
iv
ACT I.
Rome: the Audience-Room of the Empress in the Regia. Julia Domna and Varonilla.v
Empress, you bade me leave my orbèd temple,
And leave my Vestals.
Sudden the command.
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JULIA DOMNA.
Counsel. You are wise
By custom and by worship—I, alas,
Only by argument of doctrine gathered
From sages and philosophers. To-day
I need the holier aid. O Varonilla,
A mother seeks your wisdom, as she came
From a red vineyard's slope, and coil on coil
Bewildered of its circumstance, to rest
In a cool grove.
(Varonilla presses her hands on the hands of the Empress as they sit down together.)
VARONILLA.
Oh, patience!
JULIA DOMNA.
Nay, not patience,
An instant remedy. Too cool your hand,
Though I have prayed for coolness.
VARONILLA.
What extreme
Disturbs you, Empress? You have all my prayers
Through all my virgin days—for you, for Rome
They rise in sacrifice.
JULIA DOMNA.
For me, O Vestal,
And for my sons.
VARONILLA.
As they are lords of Rome.
JULIA DOMNA.
As they are mine, my sons—my womanhood
Grown valiant, my warriors and my gods;
As they are mine, and you would succour me,
Give me your counsel for my jarring sons.
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Whence springs the strife? I know the elder boy
Most dominant of will, the second haughty,
But easy to appease: such elements
Are not as sea and fire.
JULIA DOMNA.
Even in their games
They fought so intricate, I could but stand
And pray them to unlock. Now in their manhood . . .
How speak of it! I faint at their approach,
I tremble if together they salute me.
They have no eyes, save for each other's faces,
Or fix on mine, so jealous of my favour
I dare not smile nor drop one little kiss
On Geta's brow, where 'neath the flecking wreath
I dote on it, nor gather in my palms
My Caracalla's head and feel my world
There in the goodly orb. I dare not move
Nor blink an eyelid lest they close in strife
So rancorous I might be left alone.
You question wherefore!
But wherefore doth the north wind bring us wrecks,
The south wind locusts? Wherefore? It is hidden.
O Priestess, you distract me, for I fear,
Watching your coldness, that you have no heart
To look into my misery.
(She rises, steadying herself against the Vestal.)
Conceive!
Each sole and each essential, yet at war—
Now they would break the world in two, would rule
One here in Rome and one in Antioch . . .
Where shall I rule?
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O lady, recollect,
Some ills of nature find their remedies
In their own violent instincts. And the peril
Is often in the curb. What is the earthquake
But fatal rigour
Put on the wild expulsion of those streams
That flame about their mountain-roots!
JULIA DOMNA.
The judgment
Of a cold heart the womb has never pressed.
VARONILLA.
You have forgotten Vesta keeps alight
The hearth-flame of the peoples. Verily
Her counsel is not chill, but of a function
To spread its blessing.
JULIA DOMNA.
How, its blessing, woman?
VARONILLA.
Yea, on the subjects of your jarring sons;
Yea, on your sons themselves, for peace is sacred
And grows Hesperian gifts; yea, and on you,
For so shall your maternity establish
No hope where ruin labours.
JULIA DOMNA.
Varonilla,
Not from your voice that never cooed a song
Above the milking babe, may such as I
Receive true adjurations.
VARONILLA.
(Retiring.)
Then farewell.
Your courtiers approach.
JULIA DOMNA.
Stay, Varonilla.
It is the grave Papinian. . . . If he sentence
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My life and motherhood . . .
(Papinian advances.)
Papinian, hither!
This reverend lady would dismember Rome,
And give a half to Antioch.
PAPINIAN.
Forbid,
Ye Roman Gods!
VARONILLA.
I for one household speak
Of ended variance; and for the people,
Beneath the diverse empire of opponents
In whirlwind from two quarters of the air.
JULIA DOMNA.
I am the peace of these opponents, therefore
The safe-guard of their lives and empire.
PAPINIAN.
Nature
Is with you in your cause—and Rome herself,
Rome that is one. There is no other city
Where emperors can live imperial; nature
And polity are with you.
VARONILLA.
But with Vesta
Is steadfast, lamplit wisdom in the darkness
Of polity and nature.
PAPINIAN.
Most revered,
You counsel as a woman, not as Jove,
Who sees the sweep and precedents of action,
With rolling eye above the universe.
Your lamp is to a little holy circle
Its aureola: there the deed is seen
But in itself without far consequence.
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To interdict it, and the gods restrain.
JULIA DOMNA.
O peerless helper!
What large delivery of all my heart
Was still beneath! Now I can hold my Court.
(Enter Roman ladies and courtiers. Papinian, bowing low, slips a parchment into the Empress' hand.)
PAPINIAN.
And take our gifts.
JULIA DOMNA.
My Stoic, meditation
Will come with the more even hours: my thanks.
MANY VOICES.
The high gods bless our Empress with long life
Of happy days.
JULIA DOMNA.
(Smiling, as she receives gifts.)
A jewel—
A wound of light, for so would bleed the sun.
(Enter Fadilla.)
And flowers . . .
Roses that swell up to the gaze—such roses,
From you, Fadilla, come to give your welcome
To my new year of age.
(Perceiving Geta at a distance, who enters, followed by Pylades.)
Papinian, look!
My Geta!—Vestal, you must envy me.
VARONILLA.
The boy is very fair, and yet for Rome,
Were there dispute, he is not Romulus.
JULIA DOMNA.
I shudder. See, Papinian, see, Fadilla,
A favour rests on him, a grace: his brows . . .
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Are as my brother's, Empress. My old age
Is quickened of the vision. Thus Olympus
Pricks out its favourites. This smarting beauty,
And all its gifts to you Fadilla envies
With blessing in the spleen.
GETA.
(With deep obeisance.)
Hail, Domina,
My Empress.
Mother, I have brought the cup,
That Dido bent her lip on when in Carthage
She feasted with Ascanius at her heart.
Regard the chasings, how they wrought—regard—
Before the days of Rome.
JULIA DOMNA.
My Ganymede!
GETA.
Nay, mother, but behold how it is wrought,
How the age-kneaded silver smiles from dints
Sleek where no pattern waves.
JULIA DOMNA.
And Dido drank
Her sorrow from this bowl!
GETA.
It is the rareness
Of the bossed cup that made me choose it thine;
But it is full from white pit to white brim
Of wishes for thy happiness, thy health.
Nay, drink them from my lips.
JULIA DOMNA.
There, there I drink.
My thanks to you are kisses. O beloved,
How is it that I lose all eloquence
When you must be the theme? To fondle you,
To kiss you on the eyes, to cover you
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Oh pardon, we are here 'mid loving friends,
And my heart surges.
GETA.
Here among our friends!
Were I a slave it were less difficult
To steal this audience of you. Recollect
I am your son, and look henceforth that you
Caress me and in presence of my brother,
As your good pleasure prompts.
JULIA DOMNA.
If you would have me
To move in state between you, both must stay,
My constant props, beside me. Antioch—
That is your name, my Geta; so I shrieked
Last night when calling for you in a dream.
When I embrace you it is all farewell;
You are going from me, and my threatened doom
Draws down my blood to ebb, beholding you.
GETA.
O mother, mother,
It is the East my whole life levels at;
There is my mark, there is my golden empire,
There the sun rises—there, at last secure
From thwarting and from peril, I shall warble
The music of my happy star and breathe.
O mother, rule with me at Antioch,
With me in your own native Asia. Come
With me, your son, to steer your honoured craft
Home to its early port.
JULIA DOMNA.
Child, you forget
My years, because I smile with countenance
The gods have wafted youth to. You forget
That constantly to pass the cruel sea,
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The openness of chance by land and sky,
Would bow me to my grave. And to these labours
Add sorrow of continual taking leave
Or fear of it as boding.
Caracalla!
The book beneath his lids—it is a wrath
That seems to have a thirst in it.
(Caracalla enters; he is wrapped in a dark hooded Gallic cloak. A splendid robe of gold tissue is borne before him. Tarantus follows.)
My son,
But almost I am speechless at this bliss,
(Nervously handling the netting.)
The richness of this present. Caracalla,
Your lips.
CARACALLA.
He is before me. This shall cease.
You have received him and his gift.
JULIA DOMNA.
Beloved,
Our love is not of time or of its laws;
And for your gift, my first-born son, I take it
Whenever it is brought as yours, the first
Of any tribute.
And so fair a netting
Of golden tissue, you would bring me summer
To hang on me her light.
CARACALLA.
I am forestalled,
And this is yours but as you choose or not:
So your next birthday will be here or there
At Antioch, as you choose.
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My senses swirl . . .
You all grow dim, all fade.
(Caracalla catches her in his arms.)
GETA.
Mother, look up.
We will delay our plan, do anything
If you revive.
CARACALLA.
(In a whisper.)
Be mine, O more than Rome!
Stay with me, stay in Europe.
GETA.
What, you whisper
Close to my mother's ear? Is this your justice,
To lure me into exile?
(To Julia Domna.)
Rouse yourself,
Say, will you banish me, be kept aloof
By Asia's farness from me?
JULIA DOMNA.
No. My strength
Is come again. I cannot slip your arms,
My Caracalla. Geta, take my hand.
You both have found a means to put the earth
And sea between you, have you not, my sons?
CARACALLA.
You know we cannot sit on golden chairs,
And side by side demur. Europe and Asia
Are for some purpose of divinity
Cleft by Propontis with his waves. Of old
It cost a man his life to swim that strait.
'Tis good it shall divide us.
PAPINIAN.
Fall of greatness,
Of all divine efficiency! My emperors,
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Has honoured past belief.
JULIA DOMNA.
Papinian, speak.
PAPINIAN.
Your mighty father left his empire, vast
And solid in its frame, to you his sons,
To be maintained, not broken by a sea.
CARACALLA.
We take our judgment now in matters dealing
With functions of a god. Jove and Augustus
Alone confer. You set yourself on high
Who are but nothing—and for what you babble
As to our father's will, he set the curse
Of dual empire on the lands, he fostered
The need of our conclusion.
JULIA DOMNA.
Asia, Europe!
The sea, an interfluent stream, a channel,
You say, will sever the huge continents
You rule betwixt you? How will you divide
Your mother, how will she be torn asunder,
And shared between you?
There is but one way;
Sheathe in my breast your swords and cleave my corse
That each may have a sepulchre to visit
In his own kingdom. So I shall be portioned,
As realms are slit for each by barren sea—
My heart as but two parcels of the world.
Yea, I must be a corse, as Rome herself,
Mother of Empire, ye will immolate,
If she be reft in two. My sons, relent.
I am your peace, between your golden chairs
I stand at one with each, sustaining both
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Is death. Deliver me!
GETA.
O well-beloved,
You set us by your prayer on the rock-edge
Of such confusion you might shudder at
If you were clear of sight nor mocked the truth.
CARACALLA.
Pain of the unendurable, the pain
And feud of it within!
VARONILLA.
O Empress, listen!
Let them apart, let the cold Hellespont
Wash safely the partition of their lives.
CARACALLA.
If we oppose the unendurable
With that which cannot be endured, the gods
Must hide their eyes.
How pale you are, grey-pale!
Some of you fetch her wine. Mother!
JULIA DOMNA.
My children,
I gave you life; return the gift to-day,
To-day, my birthday.
(Laying her head on Caracalla's breast.)
O my first-born, bid me
Live from this hour. Let me owe breath henceforward
Only to you, my terrible, my lord
And emperor. Give me life, O loved! Receive
Your brother's hand and rule in Rome together
With me beside you. Caracalla, listen!
Life, life—from you!
CARACALLA.
O mother, you have made it
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From me alone, with solitary eyes.
Geta Augustus, for her sake, I pray you
Cancel our treaty of division, dwell
In Rome. We will divide the royal palace
And not the world, that my petitioner
May live on and not die. Will you accord
Her one desire she has implanted mine?
(Geta turns from Caracalla to his mother.)
GETA.
To you I will give back the life you gave,
To you!
(Addressing Caracalla.)
I will remain with her in Rome;
A boon she has implored.
JULIA DOMNA.
Your hands in mine,
Folded upon my bosom, on my heart—
One clasp. Forgive, these tears are happiness.
Wine? I have now no need of it, who drink
Your mercy, Caracalla; my dear Geta,
The faith of love you give, wreathing the cup
Your brother steeped.
Ah, I am well and strong.
Romans, acclaim with feastings, and piled altars,
And mirth this reconcilement. Let the Temple
Of Concord smoke till evening, for the gods
Make peace.
CARACALLA.
(In her ear.)
If gods make peace, your grey-pale face
Is first among them.
JULIA DOMNA.
Hush! We have been speaking
Across an air not made for flight of words
To carry pinions. See, my Geta beams
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Both of her grateful hands.
CARACALLA.
Then both your hands
For me.
JULIA DOMNA.
Ah, Caracalla!
CARACALLA.
Both.
JULIA DOMNA.
A feast
I make for my two emperors. Pylades
Shall dance.
CARACALLA.
Tarantus?
JULIA DOMNA.
(Bowing her head.)
Show his swordman's craft.
Now to the Temple of the Queen of Heaven
I go, to praise her. You on either hand,
I do not envy her, though Queen of Heaven.
Come, women; come, Fadilla. Noble Vestal,
This is a triumph to the household fire;
None will forsake it.
(To her sons.)
Let me find you ready
For the great banquet.
(Caracalla kisses her.)
Geta!
(She kisses him.)
O my sons!
(Exeunt all, save Caracalla, Geta, Pylades, & Tarantus.)
CARACALLA.
The right wing of the palace will be mine,
You and your dancers, Grecians and musicians
May lodge upon the left. I need access
To the arena and the hippodrome.
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I take the left, and there enjoy the sun
That is so much my flatterer for hours.
CARACALLA.
See that no soul you own or dominate
Passes my threshold, or that step is death.
GETA.
Still make your bread yourself and have a care
Since we are in one stable though two stalls.
And take your branded gladiator, take him;
Strive on the rank sand as his pupil! Rome
Will shout applause of laughter.
CARACALLA.
(Turning on his heel.)
Ah, Tarantus,
Our words are blows; and there are thunder-storms
Of instant violence.
Farewell, little brother.
GETA.
And you too, little satyr!
(Exit Caracalla with Tarantus.)
(To Pylades.)
Do you cloud?
What is your grief?
You are commanded to the feast to-night;
The Empress wills you there. Nothing is changed,
Nothing in all your life.
PYLADES.
With you in Rome,
A statue cast away!
GETA.
Your power remains—it is the power to please.
Nothing is changed between us. You will dance;
I shall applaud you for a little while. . .
PYLADES.
Prince!
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And to save herself
Leave-taking agony she bids me die!
| Julia Domna | |