Propertius carmen XVI first draft translation

'I, who was once thrown open for great triumphs,

Like unto the door of Tarpeia, noted for her virtue,

Past whose threshold there cantered the gold-inlaid chariots,

Who grew damp with the suppliant teardrops of captives,

Now I, rent in sot's nightly scuffles,

Beaten by ignoble knuckles, oft complain

And for me of rank wreaths danglings there is no shortage,

And always brands lying, a sign to those she's burnt out.


'Neither can I ward off milady's ill-famed nights,

My shapely structure pilloried in vile ditties;

But nor can she endeavour to reclaim her scant honour,

Living foully enough to shame this epoch of lust.

Penned between these truths I'm pinned to lead appeals,

A sadder barred suitor - long suppliant he.


'Never does he suffer my hinges to unwind,

Carolling verses as biting as charming:


'"Door, crueller at bottom than our lady herself,

Why to me are you dumb, granite-hard, slammed clam-tight?

Why never unlatched do you receive my amours,

Know you not how, moved, to answer discreet pleas?

Will there never be granted, to end my lament,

Anything, save begrimed slumber on lukewarm lime?

Me at the night's medians, me at the star's full girths, me lying,

The breeze frozen with chill Dawn grieves me, grieves for me,

You, solely, never downcast on human accounts,

Answer with your hinges' pact of silence.


'"O, if only my whimper, thrust through some covert cranny,

Striking on milady's earlobes might return!

Allow then for the chance that Sicily's rock's milder,

That she may be harder than iron, than worked steel,

She could not yet have power to avert darling eyes,

Her heart would lurch up in sighs and wrenched tears.


'"Now soft she lounges on some blessed foe's shoulder,

And my words drop into the nightly East Wind.

But you're the lone reason for my pains - greatest, anyway,

Never to be won, door, by my favours.

You I never harrassed with my tongue's spite,

Any speech which it's usual to tell perverse blocks,

That you might be indifferent to me, rasping, pleading,

Keeping up anxious watches in some back-alley.

Indeed, I've composed verses for you, in the latest style,

And, stooped down, I have lavished kisses on your worn steps,

Prized offerings I've brought you, veils over my hands!"


'Stuff like that, that you lovestruck wretches all seem to know,

He gasps out next unto the morning larks.

Thus I now, what with milady's faults, and the lover ever

In floods of tears, well, eternal upset is my fate.'