Carmina

Catullus

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

  1. Born; (all hail!) of the gods begotten, and excellent issue
  2. Bred by your mothers, all hail! and placid deal me your favour.
  3. Oft with the sound of me, in strains and spells I'll invoke you;
  4. You too by wedding-torch so happily, highly augmented,
  5. Peleus, Thessaly's ward, in whose favor Jupiter himself,
  6. The Father of the gods, resigned his passions.
  7. You Thetis, fairest of maids Nereian, vouchsafed to marry?
  8. You did Tethys empower to woo and wed with her grandchild;
  9. Nor less Oceanus, with water compassing th' Earth-globe?
  10. But when ended the term, and wisht-for light of the day-tide
  11. Uprose, flocks to the house in concourse mighty, convened,
  12. Thessaly all, with glad assembly the Palace fulfilling:
  13. Presents afore they bring, and joy in faces declare they.
  14. Cieros abides a desert: they quit Phthiotican Tempe,
  15. Homesteads of Crannon-town, eke bulwarkt walls Larissa;
  16. Meeting at Pharsalus, and roof Pharsalian seeking.
  17. None will the fields now till; soft wax all necks the oxen,
  18. Never the humble vine is purged by curve of the rake-tooth,
  19. Never a pruner's hook thins out the shade of the tree-tufts,
  20. Never a bull up-plows broad glebe with bend of the coulter,
  21. Over whose point unuse displays the squalor of rust-stain.
  22. But in the homestead's heart, where'er that opulent palace
  23. Hides a retreat, all shines with splendour of gold and of silver.
  24. Ivory blanches the seats, bright gleam the flagons a-table,
  25. All of the mansion joys in royal riches and grandeur.
  26. But for the Diva's use bestrewn is the genial bedstead,
  27. Hidden in midmost stead, and its polisht framework of Indian
  28. Tusk underlies its cloth empurpled by juice of the dye-shell.
  29. This be a figured cloth with forms of manhood primeval
  30. Showing by marvel-art the gifts and graces of heroes.
  31. Here upon Dia's strand wave-resonant, ever-regarding
  32. Theseus borne from sight outside by fleet of the fleetest,
  33. Stands Ariadne with heart full-filled with furies unbated,
  34. Nor can her sense as yet believe she 'spies the espied,
  35. When like one that awakes new roused from slumber deceptive,
  36. Sees she her hapless self lone left on loneliest sandbank:
  37. While as the mindless youth with oars disturbeth the shallows,
  38. Casts to the windy storms what vows he vainly had vowed.
  39. Him through the sedges afar the sad-eyed maiden of Minos,