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PAGE 3

The Vigil Of Venus
by [?]

Jussit Hyblaeis tribunal stare diva floribus;
Praeses ipsa jura dicit, adsederunt Gratiae.
Hybla, totos funde floras quidquid annus adtulit;
Hybla, florum rumpe vestem quantus AEtnae campus est.

Ruris hic erunt puellae, vel puellae montium,
Quaeque silvas, quaeque lucos, quaeque fontes incolunt:

Jussit omnes adsidere mater alitis dei,
Jussit et nudo puellas nil Amori credere.

Cras amet qui nunquam amavit; quique amavit cras amet.
She has set up her court, has Our Lady, in Hybla, and deckt it with blooms:–
With the Graces at hand for assessors Dione dispenses her dooms.
Now burgeon, O Hybla! put forth and abound, till Proserpina’s field,
To the foison thy lap overflowing its laurel of Sicily yield.
Call, assemble the nymphs–hamadryad and dryad–the echoes who court
From the rock, who the rushes inhabit, in ripples who swim and disport.
“I admonish you maids–I, his mother, who suckled the scamp ere he flew–
An ye trust to the Boy flying naked, some pestilent prank ye shall rue.”
Now learn ye to love who loved never–now ye who have loved, love anew!

Et rigentibus virentes ducit umbras floribus:
Cras erit quum primus AEther copulavit nuptias,
Et pater totum creavit vernis annum nubibus,
In sinum maritus imber fluxit almae conjugis,
Unde fetus mixtus omnes aleret magno corpore.
Ipsa venas atque mentem permeanti spiritu
Intus occultis gubernat procreatrix viribus,
Perque coelum, perque terras, perque pontum subditum
Pervium sui tenorem seminali tramite

She has coax’d her the shade of the hazel to cover the wind-flower’s birth.
Since the day the Great Father begat it, descendingin streams upon Earth;
When the Seasons were hid in his loins, and the Earth lay recumbent, a wife,
To receive in the searching and genital shower the soft secret of life.
As the terrible thighs drew it down, and conceived, as the embryo ran
Thoro’ blood, thoro’ brain, and the Mother gave all to the making of man,
She, she, our Dione, directed the seminal current to creep,
Penetrating, possessing, by devious paths all the height, all the deep.
She, of all procreation procuress, the share to the furrow laid true;

Inbuit, jussitque mundum nosse nascendi vias.
Cras amet qui nunquam amavit; quique amavit
cras amet.

Ipsa Trojanos nepotes in Latinos transtulit,
Ipsa Laurentem puellam conjugem nato dedit;
Moxque Marti de sacello dat pudicam virginem;
Romuleas ipsa fecit cum Sabinis nuptias,
Unde Ramnes et Quirites proque prole posterum
Romuli matrem crearet et nepotem Caesarem.
Cras amet qui nunquam amavit; quique amavit cras amet.

She, she, to the womb drave the knowledge, and open’d the ecstasy through.
Now learn ye to love who loved never–now ye who have loved, love anew!

Her favour it was fill’d the sail of the Trojan for Latium bound;
Her favour that won her Aeneas a bride on Laurentian ground,
And anon from the cloister inveigled the Virgin, the Vestal,
to Mars; 70
As her wit by the wild Sabine rape recreated her Rome for its wars,
With the Ramnes, Quirites, together ancestrally proud as they drew
From Romulus down to our Caesar–last, best of that bone, of that thew.
Now learn ye to love who loved never–now ye who have loved, love anew!

Rura fecundat voluptas: rura Venerem sentiunt:
Ipse Amor puer Dionse rure natus dicitur.
Hunc ager, cum parturiret ipsa, suscepit sinu:
Ipsa florum delicatis educavit osculis.
Cras amet qui nunquam amavit; quique amavit cras,
amet
.

Ecce jam super genestas explicant tauri latus,
Quisque tutus quo tenetur conjugali foedere:
Subter umbras cum maritis ecce balantum greges;
Et canoras non tacere diva jussit alites.

Pleasure planteth a field; it conceives to the passion, the pang, of his joy.
In a field was Dione in labour delivered of Cupid the Boy;
And the field in its fostering lap from her travail received him: he drew
Mother’s milk from the delicate kisses of flowers; and he prosper’d and grew–
Now learn ye to love who loved never–now ye who have loved, love anew!

Lo! behold ye the bulls, with how lordly a flank they besprawl on the broom!–
Yet obey the uxorious yoke, and are tamed to Dione her doom.
Or behear ye the sheep, to the husbanding rams how they bleat to the shade!
Or behear ye the birds, at the Goddess’ command how they sing unafraid!

Jam loquaces ore rauco stagna cycni perstrepunt;
Adsonat Terei puella subter umbram populi,
Ut putes motus amoris ore dici musico,
Et neges queri sororem de marito barbaro.
Ilia cantat, nos tacemus. Quando ver venit meum?
Quando fiam uti chelidon, ut tacere desinam?
Perdidi Musam tacendo, nec me Apollo respicit;
Sic Amyclas, cum tacerent, perdidit silentium.
Cras amet qui nunquam amavit; quique amavit cras amet.

Be it harsh as the swannery’s clamour that shatters the hush of the lake,
Be it dulcet as where Philomela holds darkling the poplar awake,
So melting her soul into music, you’d vow ’twas her passion, her own,
She plaineth–her sister forgot, with the Daulian crime long-agone.
Hark! Hush! Draw around to the circle … Ah, loitering Summer! Say when
For me shall be broken the charm, that I chirp with the swallow again?
I am old; I am dumb; I have waited to sing till Apollo withdrew–
So Amyclae a moment was mute, and for ever a wilderness grew.
Now learn ye to love who loved never–now ye who have loved, love anew,
To-morrow!–to-morrow!