Priapeia

Priaepia

by divers poets in English verse and prose. Translated by Sir Richard Burton and Leonard C. Smithers

  1. The damsel dowered with no fatuous coynte.
  1. Yon Telethusa befamèd amid the damsels Suburran
  2. (Who by her gains I hold freedwoman now is become)
  3. Girds with a gilded crown, O Holy! thine inguinal organ,
  4. Held by the pathic girls like in degree to a god.
  1. Whoso comes hither shall a bard become
  2. And to me dedicate facetious verse;
  3. But who thiswise doth not, 'mid learnèd poets
  4. Shall pace with fundament fulfilled of 'figs'.
  1. Bailiff Aristagoras of his grapes high-pedigree'd boasting
  2. Apples moulded in wax giveth, O Godhead, to thee:
  3. But thou, pleased with the fruit in effigy placed on thine altar,
  4. Genuine 'fruit' vouchsafe he, O Priapus! shall bear.
  1. Refrain from deeming all my sayings be
  2. In sport bespoken for mine own disport;
  3. Thieves taken thrice or four tunes in the fact
  4. (Believe my word) I'll surely irrumate.
  1. What shouldest say this spear (although I'm wooden) be wishing
  2. Whenas a maiden chance me in the middle to kiss?
  3. Here none augur we: need: believe my word she is saying -