Propertius carmen I - first draft translation

Cynthia caught me, the wretch, with her eyes,

Touched not at all before by amorousness.

Then he cast down my glance of steadfast scorn,

Love did, and my head crushed with hob-nailed feet,

Until he tutored me chaste maids to hate -

The reprobate! - and to live with no aim.

This spasm has not flagged for a year's length,

Though crossed by gods I'm forced to own as mine.


Milanion recalled, Tullus, that faint-heart never

Fair lady won, when he smashed flint Iaside's tantrum.

Maddened in just this way he staggered in Parthenian grottoes,

And he went on to survey hairy brutes.

He even, smitten with the Hylaean branch's hurt,

Squirming in agony, at Arcady's steeps moaned.

Thus could he housetrain the flighty lass:

So highly are prayers and mighty feats valued in love.


In me sluggard Love cannot think of such crafts,

Nor remember even the known ways he's trodden before.

But you, whose lie it is that you've led off the Moon,

And appease blasphemies by toiled incantations,

Drive and alter then the mind of mistress mine,

And outshine her complexion, that grows paler than I!

Then will I trust you, that both stars and tides

Cytinaean cantrips can command.


And you, who call up a man lately fallen, friends,

Seek remedies for a heart not in full health.

Hardily I'd take surgery or harsh cautery,

If thence might come licence to speak as my wrath wills.

Send me through outland tribes, and send me through waves,

Whither no women might learn of my pathway;

You stay, to whom the god attends and is kind,

And be always equals in a love secure.


In me our Venus lays on nights - bitter ones -

And Love is missing from no hour - unfulfilled.

From this curse, I warn you, fly: anyone should hoard

His affection, nor vary from love assured one jot.

Because he who gives ear to my urging, yet late,

Will - alas - carry back my wail with such sorrow.

The Flowers of Valentine

Wreathed to cure the plague maybe

In the Christian time

They hung about the nape of the cruel fresh


And might have been dishevelled by accident

When one of my forerunners caught a sepal

Wound in a hairy bounding sort of crown

And cried “But these are almost real”

To the ripping sound


The florist’s writing is less beautiful

Than hers who sent them who cannot see me,

Except by clear morningshine, like before;

But the florist just whacks them out, neatly,

Bluely neatly, some mauve flowers,

In frustratingly edible and swaddled boxes.


And so indeed the date came round and

Didn’t staunch the plague or kill

The victims who had extreme unction;

Didn’t profit by my will.


The debt and dirt in layers and occlusions, let it be sowed,

As the date rolls back, as they draw back, as I go back.


But the gift was sourced and the sauce was cooked

For the voluble gander as white goosey looked,

And the funny side was greased about,

Between the shipments and proctor’s doubt,

A trope delivered is a cliché bare,

Pleasant to study.


And how we could laugh, though they died with all

Else that ever died, and Saint Valentine,

The posthumous plague-saint, the pyrrhic faith healer.

The corse of a saint is inviolate,

But his relics can rot, and these stank, and we laughed.


Two good-byes later, which I just don’t do,

And non-conversations past, which I didn’t,

I’m so grateful. We laughed very hard.

Acquisition

Red Chinese garment bought at Unicorn

I cannot say we’ll bide another night,

Or that we won’t. I know you cool me down,

A poultice up against that wound of warmth.

I love your look and think you’re fond of mine,

Can revel at my shoulders and express

Pride enough to be certain in your ride.

But though you passed sufferance, you may go.


Red garment that I bought at Unicorn,

You should know that your outer side is handsome.

It is well woven and softly repaired.

Argolid eyed it hung; drawn out it is

A banner, sure enough. But I am keener

On the smooth red creamsheen layered within,


The ideal contact, child of Unicorn,

That intimate synthesis, a kinship, and a touch,

From the collective purchase, to you, worn

Unlessened by company. Skin and you.

If this is our last night, Unicorn-silk,

We will spend it together.


Red garment bought at ancient Unicorn,

There where things have been bought or not

Bought since Christ was a cadet

(Around 1910, in the Irish arm) – know you,

You are a stopgap, love. Behind my claim

Lies desire for an unseen jacket form,

That whores its blindside, jubilating black,

That bleeds and stains its redness where you shine.


And though you are a beauty, you can’t pull

A trick like that. Count on no powers

During these sympathetic red-gold hours.

Your feeling cannot plead your case,

When I’m pledged in another place,

Though for the night, you’re needed to the full.


(I kept you as it turned out-

rival's late)

Wimple

I daresay I could, if I set my mind to it,

But my body will never be set to.

And so I never fight, I rarely look,

Why would I? When that which I see, I want?

I’ve been told I am tall enough,

The boathouse, such a place to hack that down.


But here we are, long coats wavering in step,

Rowing the air with the draped spavined lion,

And it is suffused with half-clerical fear

That I, for myself, crouch at that boathouse,


The irk of emasculation, the envy of the brave,

The guilt of the voyeur when the crews heave up

Their torpedoes, and shake them free.


I realise, still inward, the race is passing, and say,

“Which one are they? Which one?” and get no

Answer, presuppose navy blue, so catch that drama

Anyway. And they are winning.


An extended viewing I’ve scarcely deserved, all things

Being equal, and so am shamed to bawl for Ball,

And a bit comforted by this.


I find, beyond hope or qualm, the shape I have looked for,

Spiked with coldness to bump the rightful metaphor.


I cannot stay to greet it, only stare,

And scarper, to gather the spirits.


I hadn’t taken in that we were altogether first,

Which is sufficient, I suppose, at this point.


But blood and picture-postcard snow

Disturbed this feast.

Towering

Did we know it existed?

Shall we climb up within it?

Travel with an armed guard, then,

Benedick’s stong arm, and his girl’s meekness,

Artemis to the fore, Freyja to the aft,

Whither the winged lion would speak with you.


At Joyous Gard, I am a frequent guest.

They tend to put me next to Bors the good,

With Guinevere opposite. Another another’s,

And I care elsewhere, and so am safe here.


The plastic arras, it was apposite

For murder or for jinks, not for a clutch.

But we had left some happy ones

To search about the pretty night

Preferring ourselves to do as plants do,

To rustle.


The vultures may not eat but speak.

The white bird sent me out to pine,

And watched me netted in the reek

Of chugged up, patronised red wine.


What kind of thing is this? Feather, fake, fur,

Two persons or three or a pangoline?

The Queen shrugs off revolt, incarnated

In such a beautiful and noteless sound.

God Save Her with a golden liturgy,

God and I and another sirens serve.

Lupercalia. The order foreseen

So she spoke:

13th Feb

Anointing.
Bacchic state.
Frustrated search.
Purification and Rebirth.
Hymn to the Gods.
Lyric poetry.
Symposium.
Confrontation of Duty.
Aeolus and Cupid
bar, bar, ian
Flaying at the Dionysia

14th Feb

Piety
Confusion
Despair
Duty arisen
Amphitheatred
Being Whored
Becoming Innured
Flayed at the Dionysia

15th Feb

Meditation.
Self-reproach.
Asceticism.
Examination.
Curst deluge

And to survive I feigned that I
Was ignorant of Delphic Greek

So-So Drunk, Not So Drunk

You worry what you might have said?

My memory is good – but you’d

Rather not know. Yet surely you won’t mind

If I now tell you what, tonight, you did not say.


Never a syllable passed on a brow

Or garment or eye of a single man.

(Though tentative knives set about carving

At women, but that does does not count)


Suppose a yardarm had been raised,

Suppose a gallows-tree had creaked,

Suppose an oath had tied a mind, and then

Suppose what speech I could have made.


As I recall, I made it, and, along two anecdotes,

Clothpegged it hung strangled out and beat down.

That was before I tumbled and I ripped

And my dialogue became, well, less exact.


Before I fell, too, I talked with a prize

Bitch nestled in an alpha-nursed boudoir

Who joined her voice to throw my essay out

Perhaps remembering how I’d mocked hers,

In academic sense. Quite well set up,

These folk can play at prophets, powerful,

Unerring, right, salted and harnessed spite,

A cartel on an unknown-purging ride.

You see I wasn’t playing.


You weren’t playful; set to sleep, your mind

Quite lax. You did not declare love

For any being (inc. me) as you know,

You moved those limpid arms from side to side,

You stuck by rowing, analysed your course.

You went to bed.

You aren’t dull. You weren’t hoarse.


The night is small just as the quad is cold

And square shaped and contains none else.

The chorus part and gouged cloth is the king’s.