Priapeia

Priaepia

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

  1. Forceful is Mars with brand, spear, O Minerva, is thine;
  2. Liber engages in fray, confiding on sheaflets of Thyrsi;
  3. By th' Apollinean hand shafts (they assure us) are shot;
  4. Hercules' right is armed with the club that cannot be conquer'd;
  5. But a distended yard makes me an object of awe.
  1. Wealth is my loss! Do thou vouchsafe lend aid to my prayer,
  2. Nor, by thy signal shown, me, O Priapus, betray:
  3. Whatso before thee I laid, of home-grown apples the firstlings,
  4. (Prithee, be pleased not to tell!) from Via Sacra be ta'en.
  1. An fro' me woman shall thieve or plunder me man or a man-child,
  2. She shall pay me with coynte, that with his mouth, this with arse.
  1. Whoso of violets here shall pluck or rose,
  2. Or furtive greens or apples never bought,
  3. May he in want of woman or of boy