User:WillowW/Catullus translations

Drafts

 * Catullus 2


 * Little bird, my girlfriend loves you
 * and loves to play with you, to hold you
 * in her bosom, to dangle her finger
 * for you to nip at. When she,
 * the radiant girl of my longing,
 * delights in sweet silly games with you,
 * I think she is seeking comfort for her sorrows,
 * to soothe her troubled heart.
 * If only my sad soul could find such relief
 * by playing with you!


 * Catullus 5


 * Let us live, Lesbia, and let us love —
 * ignore the small-minded talk of old people!
 * The sun sets and rises again,
 * but we live only once; after the brief sunshine
 * of our lives, a night of eternal sleep will claim us.
 * Give me a thousand kisses, and then a hundred,
 * then another thousand and a second hundred,
 * then thousands more kisses until we've lost count;
 * we should not keep track, neither we nor any
 * evil-minded person who might envy us our kisses.


 * Catullus 10


 * While I was lounging around the town square, Varus spotted me
 * and introduced me to his latest girlfriend. She seemed
 * a little trashy, but not too bad in looks and charm.
 * Arriving at his house, we started chatting about this-and-that,
 * but especially about Bythnia, how things were going there,
 * and how much money I'd made.
 * I told her the truth: that nobody got rich,
 * not the locals, not the soldiers,
 * not the praetor, and especially
 * not those that the praetor screwed over;
 * the soldiers for sure didn't get jack.
 * etc.


 * Catullus 12


 * Marrucinus Asinius, your sneaky left hand
 * is up to no good when, drunk and jesting,
 * you snitch the napkins from your careless host.
 * You think it's funny? Guess again, punk:
 * It's as low and uncool as you can sink.
 * Don't believe me? Believe your own brother, Pollio,
 * who would give serious money for you to abandon
 * your sneaky ways — at least there's a kid
 * with dignity and half a brain.
 * Send me my napkin or expect an avalanche of poems.
 * I don't give a damn about how much the napkins cost;
 * but they were a memento of some close friends.
 * Fabullus and Verianus gave them to me as a gift,
 * woven of the finest Spanish cloth,
 * and I love them as much as I love my friends.


 * Catullus 13


 * Dear Fabullus, please come to a dinner-party
 * at my house in a few days (gods be willing).
 * Just bring along a delicious dinner, oh and
 * don't forget a pretty girl and some wine
 * and lots of laughs for everyone.
 * I promise you, you charmer, you will feast —
 * but bring the goodies: your Catullus' wallet
 * is bulging only with cobwebs.
 * In return you'll have pure friendship,
 * or something more elegant and delightful:
 * I'll give you an oil, which my girl has got
 * from the goddesses of love;
 * when you smell it, Fabullus, you will beg the gods
 * to make you nothing but nose.


 * Catullus 16


 * I'll fuck you up your ass and down your throat,
 * you cock-sucker Aurelius and fudge-packed Furius!
 * Just because my verses are tender doesn't mean
 * that I've gone all soft. Sure, a poet should focus
 * on writing poetry and not on sex; but does that
 * mean they can't write about sex? If a poem is
 * in good taste, well-written and sexy,
 * it can tingle and stiffen even hairy old men,
 * not just horny teenagers. You think I'm a sissy
 * because I write about thousands of kisses?
 * I'll fuck you up your ass and down your throat!


 * Catullus 96


 * The dead are silent, Calvus.
 * But if they can find pleasure or contentment
 * in our grief, in our longing
 * that revives old loves and makes us
 * weep for abandoned friendships,
 * then Quintilia surely grieves less for her own premature death,
 * than she feels joy in how much you loved her.


 * Catullus 109


 * You promise me, my dear, that
 * our happy love will last forever.
 * Great gods, let her be able to promise truly,
 * Let her speak sincerely from her heart,
 * So that we can live out our lives
 * Bonded by hallowed friendship.