Carmina

Catullus

Catullus, Gaius Valerius. The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catullus. Burton, Sir Richard Francis, translator. London, Printed for the Translators, 1894.

  1. (Oh hapless birdie and Oh deed of bane!)
  2. Now by your wanton work my girl appears
  3. With turgid eyelids tinted rose by tears.
  1. Yonder Pinnace ye (my guests!) behold
  2. Saith she was erstwhile fleetest-fleet of crafts,
  3. Nor could by swiftness of aught plank that swims,
  4. Be she outstripped, whether paddle plied,
  5. Or fared she scudding under canvas-sail.
  6. Eke she defieth threat'ning Adrian shore,
  7. Dare not denay her, insular Cyclades,
  8. And noble Rhodos and ferocious Thrace,
  9. Propontis too and blustering Pontic bight.
  10. Where she (my Pinnace now) in times before,
  11. Was leafy woodling on Cytórean Chine
  12. For ever loquent lisping with her leaves.
  13. Pontic Amastris! Box-tree-clad Cytórus!
  14. Cognisant were ye, and you weet full well
  15. (So saith my Pinnace) how from earliest age
  16. Upon your highmost-spiring peak she stood,
  17. How in your waters first her sculls were dipt,
  18. And thence thro' many and many an important strait
  19. She bore her owner whether left or right,
  20. Where breezes bade her fare, or Jupiter deigned
  21. At once propitious strike the sail full square;
  22. Nor to the sea-shore gods was aught of vow
  23. By her deemed needful, when from Ocean's bourne
  24. Extreme she voyaged for this limpid lake.
  25. Yet were such things whilome: now she retired
  26. In quiet age devotes herself to thee
  27. (0 twin-born Castor) twain with Castor's twin.
  1. Love we (my Lesbia!) and live we our day,
  2. While all stern sayings crabbed sages say,
  3. At one doit's value let us price and prize!
  4. The Suns can westward sink again to rise
  5. But we, extinguished once our tiny light,
  6. Perforce shall slumber through one lasting night!
  7. Kiss me a thousand times, then hundred more,
  8. Then thousand others, then a new five-score,
  9. Still other thousand other hundred store.