seven from the greek anthology
TRANSCRIPT
Trustees of Boston University
Seven from the Greek AnthologyAuthor(s): Edwin MorganSource: Arion, Vol. 6, No. 4 (Winter, 1967), pp. 492-493Published by: Trustees of Boston UniversityStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20163097 .
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SEVEN FROM THE GREEK ANTHOLOGY
Translated by Edwin Morgan
MELEAGER
Each time I Ue in Cydflla's arms, casual by day or daring by night, I watch my path as it edges a guff, I watch the dice decide my Ufe. But why should I watch? The slave of love lives by audacity?day and night
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White violet and rain-loving jonquil in bloom
already, already the wandering hillside Uly, and already Zenophila, my dear rose of Persuasion
blooms, flower of flowers, immaculate, loved by love.
Bright-haired fields, you flash your smiles in vain: hers is the greatest beauty: hide your garlands.
A.P.5.144 0 bitter roUers of love's sea, jealousies like ceaseless winds, howl and surge of our revels :
where wfll you drive me when my reason is rudderless? ShaU I Uve as the sweet prey of ScyUa's pleasures?
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Dead HeUodora, take these tears of mine,
my love's last gift to you in your grave in die shades :
they are tears of pain, and tears of recoUection: 1 yearn upon your tomb?you Ue in my heart, in my
heart How dear to me stfll! Sadly Meleager laments you and Acheron takes this unavailing tribute.
Where is the beauty I loved? That beauty is death's. I am bereaved. Dust fills the blowing flower. O earth, mother and nurse of aU things, gendy enfold in your grasp this girl for whom we grieve.
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Edwin Morgan 493
PAUL THE SnJENTIART
Rather your wrinkles, Ph?inna, than the rising sap! Rather my hands were fiUed with the heaviness of your drooping breasts in their ripe clusters than feel the firm-set breasts of a mere girl. I love your harvest, let others keep their spring. Your winter warms me more than any summer.
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The man a mad dog bites has a madness: he sees the brute's race in each sheet of water. Love must be my mad dog, it has planted its pitiless teeth in my heart, and my madness is to see your dear image dancing on the waves, in the swirling river and in the goblet of wine.
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Late, late is Cleophantis!?the third time now that the lamp wick has curled over and gone dead.
Would that my heart's flame sank with the fading lamp and burned me no longer with its anxious passion! How often she swore to Cytherea she would see me at
dusk! Light are her promises to Cytherea and to me.
A.P.5.279
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