Priapeia

Priaepia

by divers poets in English verse and prose. Translated by Sir Richard Burton and Leonard C. Smithers

  1. 'Ware of my catching! If caught, with rod I never will harm thee
  2. Nor to thee deal sore wound using my sickle that curves.
  3. Pierced with a foot-long pole thy skin shall be stretched in such fashion
  4. Thou shalt be fain to believe ne'er had a wrinkle thine arse.
  1. A she (than Hector's parent longer aged,
  2. Sister to Cumae's Sibyl seemeth me;
  3. Equal to thee whom, to his home returned,
  4. Theseus found lying in the fosse a-cold!)
  5. Hither with tottering gait is wont to come;
  6. And, wrinkled hands upraising to the stars,
  7. Begs that she'll never fail a yard to find;
  8. And, as yester'een she prayed ere daylight fled