From the Journals of Iphigenia

  So gentle is she, Artemis the holy,

  She will not have her sacred altar

  Stained with innocent blood.

  She healed me, born me away

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  To this cursed barbaric land.

  A fierce people here lives.

  Their savage custom to spill

  The blood of any Greek they seize.

  In greatest irony, Artemis had me

  Be the high priestess of her sacred grove.

  I have served and I have served,

  Countless doomed bodies I cleansed:

  Old, young, strong, frail, good, evil,

  All went to Hades’ dark embrace.

  My own countrymen, my brothers and sisters,

  To be put to death by my cursed divine hand.

  The guilt is unbearable,

  I wish for deliverance.

  I pray toward Apollo,

  And Truth he speaks:

  There is but one thread

  For me in this world:

  Not father the betrayer

  But little brother dear.