Theocritus Part 21

But Aphrodite pitied And bade them loose his chain.

The boar from that day forward Still followed in her train; Nor ever to the wildwood Attempted to return, But in the focus of Desire Preferred to burn and burn.

IDYLL x.x.xI.

Loves.

Ah for this the most accursed, unendurable of ills!

Nigh two months a fevered fancy for a maid my bosom fills.

Fair she is, as other damsels: but for what the simplest swain Claims from the demurest maiden, I must sue and sue in vain.

Yet doth now this thing of evil my longsuffering heart beguile, Though the utmost she vouchsafes me is the shadow of a smile: And I soon shall know no respite, have no solace e'en in sleep.

Yesterday I watched her pa.s.s me, and from down-dropt eyelids peep At the face she dared not gaze on--every moment blushing more-- And my love took hold upon me as it never took before.

Home I went a wounded creature, with a gnawing at my heart; And unto the soul within me did my bitterness impart.

"Soul, why deal with me in this wise? Shall thy folly know no bound?

Canst thou look upon these temples, with their locks of silver crowned, And still deem thee young and shapely? Nay, my soul, let us be sage; Act as they that have already sipped the wisdom-cup of age.

Men have loved and have forgotten. Happiest of all is he To the lover's woes a stranger, from the lover's fetters free: Lightly his existence pa.s.ses, as a wild-deer fleeting fast: Tamed, it may be, he shall voyage in a maiden's wake at last: Still to-day 'tis his to revel with his mates in boyhood's flowers.

As to thee, thy brain and marrow pa.s.sion evermore devours, Prey to memories that haunt thee e'en in visions of the night; And a year shall scarcely pluck thee from thy miserable plight."

Such and divers such reproaches did I heap upon my soul.

And my soul in turn made answer:--"Whoso deems he can control Wily love, the same shall lightly gaze upon the stars of heaven And declare by what their number overpa.s.ses seven times seven.

Will I, nill I, I may never from my neck his yoke unloose.

So, my friend, a G.o.d hath willed it: he whose plots could outwit Zeus, And the queen whose home is Cyprus. I, a leaflet of to-day, I whose breath is in my nostrils, am I wrong to own his sway?"

FRAGMENT PROM THE "BERENICE."

Ye that would fain net fish and wealth withal, For bare existence harrowing yonder mere, To this our Lady slay at even-fall That holy fish, which, since it hath no peer For gloss and sheen, the dwellers about here Have named the Silver Fish. This done, let down Your nets, and draw them up, and never fear To find them empty * * * *

EPIGRAMS AND EPITAPHS.

I.

Yours be yon dew-steep'd roses, yours be yon Thick-cl.u.s.tering ivy, maids of Helicon: Thine, Pythian Paean, that dark-foliaged bay; With such thy Delphian crags thy front array.

This horn'd and s.h.a.ggy ram shall stain thy shrine, Who crops e'en now the feathering turpentine.

II.

To Pan doth white-limbed Daphnis offer here (He once piped sweetly on his herdsman's flute) His reeds of many a stop, his barbed spear, And scrip, wherein he held his h.o.a.rds of fruit.

III.

Daphnis, thou slumberest on the leaf-strown lea, Thy frame at rest, thy springes newly spread O'er the fell-side. But two are hunting thee: Pan, and Priapus with his fair young head Hung with wan ivy. See! they come, they leap Into thy lair--fly, fly,--shake off the coil of sleep!

IV.

For yon oaken avenue, swain, you must steer, Where a statue of figwood, you'll see, has been set: It has never been barked, has three legs and no ear; But I think there is life in the patriarch yet.

He is handsomely shrined within fair chapel-walls; Where, fringed with sweet cypress and myrtle and bay, A stream ever-fresh from the rock's hollow falls, And the ringleted vine her ripe store doth display: And the blackbirds, those shrill-piping songsters of spring, Wake the echoes with wild inarticulate song: And the notes of the nightingale plaintively ring, As she pours from her dun throat her lay sweet and strong.

Sitting there, to Priapus, the gracious one, pray That the lore he has taught me I soon may unlearn: Say I'll give him a kid, and in case he says nay To this offer, three victims to him will I burn; A kid, a fleeced ram, and a lamb sleek and fat; He will listen, mayhap, to my prayers upon that.

V.

Prythee, sing something sweet to me--you that can play First and second at once. Then I too will essay To croak on the pipes: and yon lad shall salute Our ears with a melody breathed through his flute.

In the cave by the green oak our watch we will keep, And goatish old Pan we'll defraud of his sleep.

VI.

Poor Thyrsis! What boots it to weep out thine eyes?

Thy kid was a fair one, I own: But the wolf with his cruel claw made her his prize, And to darkness her spirit hath flown.

Do the dogs cry? What boots it? In spite of their cries There is left of her never a bone.

VII.

For a Statue of aesculapius.

Far as Miletus travelled Paean's son; There to be guest of Nicias, guest of one Who heals all sickness; and who still reveres Him, for his sake this cedarn image rears.

The sculptor's hand right well did Nicias fill; And here the sculptor lavished all his skill.

VIII.

Ortho's Epitaph.

Friend, Ortho of Syracuse gives thee this charge: Never venture out, drunk, on a wild winter's night.

I did so and died. My possessions were large; Yet the turf that I'm clad with is strange to me quite.

IX.

Epitaph of Cleonicus.

Man, husband existence: ne'er launch on the sea Out of season: our tenure of life is but frail.

Think of poor Cleonicus: for Phasos sailed he From the valleys of Syria, with many a bale: With many a bale, ocean's tides he would stem When the Pleiads were sinking; and he sank with them.