THERE is no other medicine against love,
My Nicias, (so at least it seems to me)
Either to heal it or to soothe, but poetry.
That, that indeed is balmy to mens' minds,
And sweet; but then 'tis rarely to be found,
Though not by you, my friend, who are at once
Physician, and beloved by all the Nine.
It was by this the Cyclops lived among us,
I mean that ancient Polyphemus, who
Loved Galatea, when he first began
To bud about the lips and curling temples,Loved her, not merely with a common love, With gifts of fruit and flowers, and locks of hair, But wasting madness; and was all excess.
Often, from the green grass, his sheep would go Home by themselves; while he, his sea-nymph
Stayed late, and languished on the weedy shore,
From sun-rise languished, bearing in his breast
The bitter wound which the great Venus gave him.
And yet he found a medicine; for he'd sit
On a high rock, and looking o'er the sea
With long and weary earnestness, sing thus:—
O my white love, my Galatea, why
Avoid me thus ? O whiter than the curd,
More tender than the lamb, more tricksome than
The kid, and bitterer than the bright young grape;
You come sometimes, when sweet sleep holds me
You break away, when sweet sleep lets me loose ;
Gone, like a lamb, at sight of the grey wolf.
Sweet, I began to love you when you first
Came hither with my mother, to pluck leaves
Of mountain hyacinth :-I shewed the way;—
And then, and afterwards, and to this hour,
I could not cease to love you,—you, who care
Nothing about my love ;-great Jove, no, nothing!
Fair one, I know why you avoid me thus:
It is because one rugged eyebrow spreads
Across my forehead, solitary and huge,
Shading a single eye :-my nose too presses
Flat tow'rds my lip; and yet, such as I am,
I feed a thousand sheep, and from them drink
Excellent milk; and never want for cheese
In summer, nor in autumn, nor dead winter,
My dairies are so full. I too know how
To play the pipe, so as no Cyclops can,
Singing, sweet apple mine, of you and me,
Often till midnight; and I keep for you
Eleven fawns with collars round their necks.
Come to me then, for you shall have no less;
And leave the sea to strain on the dull shore.
Much sweeter nights here in my cave with me
You shall enjoy; for here the laurel grows,
Slim cypresses, brown ivy, and the vine
Sweet-fruited; and here too is water cold,
A heavenly draught, which from it's pure white
The many-wooded Ætna sends me down.
Who, with this choice, would live in the salt waves?
And yet, if in your eyes I seem still rougher
Than my own trees, they furnish me with wood,
And fire is on my hearth, and I could burn
My being rather than be without you,
Or my sole eye, though nothing else is dearer.
Ah me, that I was born a finless body,
And cannot dive to you, and kiss your hand;
Or if you grudged me that, bring yon white lilies,
Or the young poppy with it's thin red leaves.
And yet not so; for poppies grow in summer,
Lilies in spring; and so I could not, both.
But should a visitor, sweetest, in his ship
Come here to see me, I would learn to swim ;
And then I might find out, what joy there is
In living, as you do, in the dark deeps.
O Galatea, that you would come forth,
And having come, forget, as I do now
Here where I sat me, to go home again!
You should keep flocks with me, and draw the milk,
And press the cheese from the sharp-tasted curd.
|