Priapeia

Priaepia

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

  1. Bailiff Aristagoras of his grapes high-pedigree'd boasting
  2. Apples moulded in wax giveth, O Godhead, to thee:
  3. But thou, pleased with the fruit in effigy placed on thine altar,
  4. Genuine 'fruit' vouchsafe he, O Priapus! shall bear.
  1. Refrain from deeming all my sayings be
  2. In sport bespoken for mine own disport;
  3. Thieves taken thrice or four tunes in the fact
  4. (Believe my word) I'll surely irrumate.
  1. What shouldest say this spear (although I'm wooden) be wishing
  2. Whenas a maiden chance me in the middle to kiss?
  3. Here none augur we: need: believe my word she is saying -
  4. 'Let the rude spear in me work with its natural wont!'
  1. Whenas the Rigid God espied a wight
  2. Crisping his head with curling-tongs aglow
  3. That he be likest to a Moorish maid,
  4. 'Ho thou! (cried he) we tell thee, catamite;
  5. However much thou toast and curl thyself
  6. Is then a damsel more of worth, I ask,
  7. Than are the hairy honours of thy yard?'
  1. Ho girl! no whiter-skinned than Moorish man