Eclogues
Virgil
Vergil. The Poems of Vergil. Rhoades, James, translator. London: Oxford University Press, 1921.
- So may your swarms Cyrnean yew-trees shun,
- your kine with cytisus their udders swell,
- begin, if aught you have. The Muses made
- me too a singer; I too have sung; the swains
- call me a poet, but I believe them not:
- for naught of mine, or worthy Varius yet
- or Cinna deem I, but account myself
- a cackling goose among melodious swans.
- 'Twas in my thought to do so, Lycidas;
- even now was I revolving silently
- if this I could recall—no paltry song:
- “Come, Galatea, what pleasure is 't to play
- amid the waves? Here glows the Spring, here earth
- beside the streams pours forth a thousand flowers;
- here the white poplar bends above the cave,
- and the lithe vine weaves shadowy covert: come,
- leave the mad waves to beat upon the shore.”
- What of the strain I heard you singing once
- on a clear night alone? the notes I still
- remember, could I but recall the words.