By: Manal Rabiey
I am Orpheus, son of Apollo, god of light. From my mother Calliope, muse of song and poetry, I took the sweetness of voice; from my father, the power to weave music out of sunlight and the pulse of the planets. My name in the Greek tongue means “child of the deep voice” and “source of the hymn.” As I walked upon the earth the branches swayed with me, beasts shed their ferocity, and birds circled above in a sacred orbit. My voice was a blend of light and air, a tender irony that turned pain into laughter, a gentleness that lifted the soul until it forgot death.
The first time I saw Eurydice she was in a field like paradise, among golden winds and ripening grain. She appeared to me like a goddess stepped out of a dream; her hair was rivers of wheat, her eyes two gates to the sky. In that moment every string of my heart opened; she became the melody for which I had been created. I loved her until the universe itself became a single hymn between us.
When the serpent drew her down into the realm of death, I stood before Zeus and pleaded, “Return my light to me.” He answered with lightning across the heavens: “She is now in the dominion of my brother and foe Hades, and I have no power over her.” So I went without fear into the kingdom of shadows. I crossed the river of the dead, playing and singing in sorrow until the eyes of the torment-spirits overflowed with tears. Sisyphus ceased to push his stone, the cries of the damned fell silent, and even darkness bent to listen to the voice of Orpheus, son of Apollo and Calliope.
I sang and played until the black walls wept, and even Hades himself shed a stony tear in pity. He said, “Take her, and do not look back until you reach the light.” I walked through the long tunnel, Eurydice’s hand in mine, until the sun’s rays flared in my eyes. Desire overcame me and I turned. In that instant my beloved was pulled back into the dark forever.
Afterward I remained on the earth, weeping and playing until my blood became strings and my voice a prayer. I died a martyr to love and to song, and the gods raised my soul into the sky, making it a shining constellation—the Virgin—to keep my story forever above the heads of mortals, and to let the voice of Orpheus, child of light and of the hymn, echo on among the stars.
