Carmina

Catullus

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

  1. Foreheads,—Oh, deign outspeak fierce wrath from bosom outbreathing,
  2. Hither, Oh hither, speed, and lend you all ear to my grievance,
  3. Which now sad I (alas!) outpour from innermost vitals
  4. Maugre my will, sans help, blind, fired with furious madness.
  5. And, as indeed all spring from veriest core of my bosom,
  6. Suffer you not the cause of grief and woe to evanish;
  7. But with the Will wherewith could Theseus leave me in loneness,
  8. Goddesses! bid that Will lead him, lead his, to destruction."

  9. E'en as she thus poured forth these words from anguish of bosom,
  10. And for this cruel deed, distracted, sued she for vengeance,
  11. Nodded the Ruler of Gods Celestial, matchless of All-might,
  12. When at the gest earth-plain and horrid spaces of ocean
  13. Trembled, and every sphere rockt stars and planets resplendent.
  14. Meanwhile Theseus himself, obscured in blindness of darkness
  15. As to his mind, dismiss'd from breast oblivious all things
  16. Erewhile enjoined and held hereto in memory constant,
  17. Nor for his saddened sire the gladness-signals uphoisting
  18. Heralded safe return within sight of the Erechthean harbour.
  19. For 'twas told of yore, when from walls of the Virginal Deess
  20. Aegeus speeding his son, to the care of breezes committed,
  21. Thus with a last embrace to the youth spoke words of commandment:

  22. "Son! far nearer my heart (you alone) than life of the longest,
  23. Son, I perforce dismiss to doubtful, dangerous chances,
  24. Lately restored to me when eld draws nearest his ending,
  25. Since such fortune in me, and in you such boiling of valour
  26. Tear you away from me so loath, whose eyes in their languor
  27. Never are sated with sight of my son, all-dearest of figures.
  28. Nor will I send you forth with joy that gladdens my bosom,
  29. Nor will I suffer you show boon signs of favouring Fortune,
  30. But from my soul I'll first express an issue of sorrow,
  31. Soiling my hoary hairs with dust and ashes commingled;
  32. Then will I hang stained sails fast-made to the wavering yard-arms,
  33. So shall our mourning thought and burning torture of spirit
  34. Show by the dark sombre-dye of Iberian canvas spread.
  35. But, grant me the grace Who dwells in Sacred Itone,
  36. (And our issue to guard and ward the seats of Erechtheus
  37. Sware She) that if your right is besprent with blood of the Man-Bull,
  38. Then do you so-wise act, and stored in memory's heart-core
  39. Dwell these mandates of me, no time their traces untracing.
  40. Dip, when first shall arise our hills to gladden your eye-glance,
  41. Down from your every mast the ill-omened vestments of mourning,
  42. Then let the twisten ropes upheave the whitest of canvas,
  43. Wherewith splendid shall gleam the tallest spars of the top-mast,
  44. These seeing sans delay with joy exalting my spirit
  45. Well shall I wot boon Time sets you returning before me."

  46. Such were the mandates which stored at first in memory constant
  47. Faded from Theseus' mind like mists, compelled by the whirlwind,
  48. Fleet from aerial crests of mountains hoary with snow-drifts.
  49. But as the sire had sought the citadel's summit for outlook,