Trustees of Boston University

Propertius: "Monobiblos"Author(s): John WardenSource: Arion, Vol. 4, No. 2 (Summer, 1965), pp. 286-287Published by: Trustees of Boston UniversityStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20162955 .

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PROPERTIUS : MONOBIBLOS

Translated by John Warden

III

She looked like Ariadne, lying asleep on her island, a picture of peace, blind to the parting sail;

Or like Andromeda free at last from her rocky prison, her limbs relaxed in the first flush of sleep.

She looked like a girl from Thrace played out by her Bacchic

dancing, sunk to rest by the grassy banks of the river.

There she lay, breathing gently, all at peace, with her head lying on unresisting hands.

Then I staggered in, dragging my footsteps, drunk as a lord, in the small hours, when the torch was burning low.

And I had an urge?I still had some of my faculties left? to tiptoe quietly up to the bed where she lay.

I was growing hot, set on fire by a double flame, drink and desire, an insistent pair of masters;

Have a go, they said,?put your arms around her softly come closer?now then?kiss her?take her by

storm.

But I didn't dare disturb her when she looked so nice and

peaceful; she's a devil when she's roused, as I know too well.

So I just stood there watching, all eyes?like Argus gazing with some

surprise at Io's horns.

And then I took off the garland I still had on from my party, and put it gently on your sleeping brows.

If your hair was out of place, I lovingly rearranged it, and gave you apples, slipping them into your hands.

But you were far away?these gifts

meant nothing

to you, and they rolled from your lap time and again to the floor.

And once in a while you gave a start and a deep sigh. I held my breath, quick to believe the worst:

I thought you sighed at a nightmare, full of strange horrors, or a man who tried to take you against your will.

And then at last the passing moon shone full in your window, the busybody moon, outstaying its welcome.

The pale fight of its beams unshuttered your sleeping eyes_

And off she started, propped up in bed on her elbow: 'So you've

come at last, and only because that other woman

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John Warden 287

has kicked you out and closed the doors against you. Where have you spent the night?this night that belonged to me?

Look at you, creeping back with the dawn, a wreck! It'd do you good to have to spend the sort of night

you make me spend?you'd learn what cruelty is.

I sat up over my loom, trying to stave off sleep, then tired of that and played the lyre a while.

And under my breath I told myself what it's like to be jilted, and thought of the hours you spend in another's bed.

Then sleep touched me with soothing wings and brought release; but my last thoughts were thoughts of the grief you bring me.'

XXI

Soldier, Fleeing wounded from the Tuscan ramparts to avoid a fate like mine,

Why do you stare like that and roll your eyes in horror at my groaning? For I was one of you, Your comrade.

Save yourself and bring your parents joy; but to my sister Acca

a message in your tears:

that I, Gallus, escaped from the swords of Caesar

only to die at the hands of robbers.

And of all the bones that lie scattered on the Tuscan hills, tell her that these are mine.

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