De Rerum Natura

Lucretius

Lucretius. De Rerum Natura. William Ellery Leonard. E. P. Dutton. 1916.

  1. Wherefore, again, again, how merited
  2. Is that adopted name of Earth- The Mother!-
  3. Since she herself begat the human race,
  4. And at one well-nigh fixed time brought forth
  5. Each breast that ranges raving round about
  6. Upon the mighty mountains and all birds
  7. Aerial with many a varied shape.
  8. But, lo, because her bearing years must end,
  9. She ceased, like to a woman worn by eld.
  10. For lapsing aeons change the nature of
  11. The whole wide world, and all things needs must take
  12. One status after other, nor aught persists
  13. Forever like itself. All things depart;
  14. Nature she changeth all, compelleth all
  15. To transformation. Lo, this moulders down,
  16. A-slack with weary eld, and that, again,
  17. Prospers in glory, issuing from contempt.
  18. In suchwise, then, the lapsing aeons change
  19. The nature of the whole wide world, and earth
  20. Taketh one status after other. And what
  21. She bore of old, she now can bear no longer,
  22. And what she never bore, she can to-day.
  23. In those days also the telluric world
  24. Strove to beget the monsters that upsprung
  25. With their astounding visages and limbs-
  26. The Man-woman- a thing betwixt the twain,
  27. Yet neither, and from either sex remote-
  28. Some gruesome Boggles orphaned of the feet,
  29. Some widowed of the hands, dumb Horrors too
  30. Without a mouth, or blind Ones of no eye,
  31. Or Bulks all shackled by their legs and arms
  32. Cleaving unto the body fore and aft,
  33. Thuswise, that never could they do or go,
  34. Nor shun disaster, nor take the good they would.
  35. And other prodigies and monsters earth
  36. Was then begetting of this sort- in vain,
  37. Since Nature banned with horror their increase,
  38. And powerless were they to reach unto
  39. The coveted flower of fair maturity,
  40. Or to find aliment, or to intertwine
  41. In works of Venus. For we see there must
  42. Concur in life conditions manifold,
  43. If life is ever by begetting life
  44. To forge the generations one by one:
  45. First, foods must be; and, next, a path whereby
  46. The seeds of impregnation in the frame
  47. May ooze, released from the members all;
  48. Last, the possession of those instruments
  49. Whereby the male with female can unite,
  50. The one with other in mutual ravishments.