Lyrics adapted and reworked by Frank DiGiacomo and Julian R. Pace from “The Trojan Women by Euripides”
by Edith Hamilton, translator, from THREE GREEK PLAYS: Prometheus Bound, Agamemnon, and The Trojan
Women, translated by Edith Hamilton.
Copyright © 1937 by W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., renewed © 1965 by Doris Fielding Reid.
Used by permission of W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.
and
from “Helen” by Euripides in THE BACCHAE AND OTHER PLAYS by Euripides,
translated by Philip Vellacott (Penguin UK 1954, Revised 1972). Copyright © Philip Vellacott, 1954, 1972.
Reproduced by permission of Penguin Books Ltd.

Cassandra, daughter of Queen Hecuba and King Priam, and priestess of Apollo, appears by torchlight from a group of women. In a mysterious and hieratical manner she commands that there be honor, dancing and praise for her forced, sacrilegious marriage to Agamemnon, high King of the Greeks. Through her prophetic gift she knows that the King’s arrogant act will cause his and his family’s destruction, and she welcomes the coming revenge she will bring down on their heads.
Her conciousness drifts in and out of her madness. As her dance and aria becomes more and more hysterical, she is finally carried off by the Greek soldiers. Two major excerpts from this extended scene, “Flowers of the God” and “Crown my triumph now” have been combined to make this solo concert aria by Erwin R. Vrooman.

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LYRICS:
Cassandra:
    Flowers of the God I love, garment of mystery, I cast you away.
    Forgotten is God, holy mystery and joy.
    Swift winds will carry them up to you,
    God of Truth.
    Come, let us hasten to my marriage bed,
    where we two shall rest, bridegroom and bride,
    within the house of the Dead. Ah!
    Oh joy, oh triumph, oh splendor, oh, lift up the flame.
    Oh joyfully sing for the bride, maidens of Troy,
    sing your songs of joy, lift high the light.

(As an invocation.)

    Oh Queen of Night,
    give your starlight to a virgin bed as you did of old.
    Crown my triumph with wreaths and with dancing!
    My mother, do not weep.
    We shall meet again, and I, victorious,
    shall bring down ruin on those who destroyed us.
    Come! ah come!

(She begins to compulsively move, in an erratic dance-like motion,
with hieratic movements, somewhat mysteriously.)

    Fly, dancing feet, on with the dance, dance for my father dead,
    most blessed, to die: holiest of dances.
    Apollo will lead the dance,
    for in the sacred grove I served his altar.
    Dance, Mother, come keep step with me,
    your feet with my feet, your hands with my hands,
    your voice with my voice tracing the measure, tracing the measure.
    Fly, dancing feet, on with the dance, holiest of dances.
    Be glad, dance with me, for I shall be wed to a king.
    Send me to him, and should I shrink away, drive me with violence,
    for my marriage bed will be our triumph,
    for my marriage bed will be our triumph!
    Come with me and dance — come with me and dance!

(She suddenly stops as if dazed and speaks to her mother.)

    Mother, listen to me: for this one time I am not raving.
    What was all this for?
    The Greek King destroyed what he loved most to retrieve what he hated.
    We are far happier than the Greeks!

    Cassandra:
    Crown my triumph now with wreaths and dancing feet!
    Sing to the marriage god, sing for Cassandra!
    Set the flame alight to kindle marriage torches!
    Honor to him whose bed now I am driven to share.
    Crown my triumph with wreaths and with dancing!
    Be glad and dance with me, for I shall be wed to a king!
    Send me to him: and should l shrink away,
    then drive me with violence —
    for know you not my marriage bed will be our triumph?
    I shall kill him, Mother; through me will his house be laid low!
    Then crown my joy with wreaths and dancing!
    Send me to him, Agamemnon the great,
    the glorious lord of Greece.
    The axe will fall first on his neck, then mine,
    on husband and on mother and brother and daughter and son.
    So he will wed me and pull his house down!
    Send me to the ship; spread the sail, catch the wind —
    sail on to Argos!
    Ah!

(The last is delivered as a scream of agony. Arms outstretched, she is led away by the soldiers.)