#palazzocore

Book III Elegy VII: A Problem!

Not that I think she isn’t lovely, and so cultured, not that I haven’t often wished for her in my dreams! Yet I held her, all in vain, completely slack,lay there a limp reproach, a burden to the bed:though I really wanted it, and the girl wanted it too,I could get no more from my exhausted parts. She threw her ivory arms around my neck, arms whiter than the Scythian snows, struggling, she mingled tongues in eager kisses, and slipped a wanton thigh beneath my thigh, and spoke coaxing words, called me her master,and all those usual words that might help.Yet my member, as if touched by cold hemlock,was sluggish and denied my every effort: I lay an inert body, a sham, a useless weight,unsure whether I was a body or a ghost. What old age will come, to me, if it does come, when youth itself fails me in this way? Ah, I’m ashamed of my years: why youth and strength if my girl can’t feel my youth or strength? She rose like a holy priestess going to the eternal flame, like an elder sister leaving a beloved brother. Yet I lately had golden Chlide twice, Pitho the beautiful and Libas, three times without stopping: I remember Corinna, in one short night, demanded I keep it up for her nine times together. Has some Thessalian poison weakened my cursed body? Do charms and herbs hurt my poor self now, some witch transfixes my name in scarlet wax and sticks fine needles right into my liver? Charms turn the stricken wheat to barren grasses, charms stop the stricken waters at their source, through incantations oaks drop acorns, vines their grapes, and the apples fall down without being shaken. Why shouldn’t I be stopped, and my vigour numbedby magic arts, my body by that made unable to endure? Add shame to it: the shame itself, of it, hurt me: that was the secondary cause of my failure. But what a girl, whom I only saw and touched! Just as her slip itself touches her. At her touch Nestor might be made young again, and Tithonus stronger in old age. I held her, but she did not hold a man. What can I think of now to beg for in prayer? I think the great gods were sorry they gave the gift that I’ve made use of so shamefully. I wanted to be welcomed – I was truly welcome:to kiss – I kissed: to be near her – I was.What was such good luck worth? Why have and not enjoy?Why eager for wealth and not possess its power? I’m parched like Tantalus, silent now, in the midst of fruit and water, he who can never touch it. Has anyone ever risen early from his girl so he can go straight to the gods and pray? No, she’s seductive: squandered so many kisses on me: urged me on with every one of her powers! She could have moved heavy oak-trees, stirred hard adamant, or the deafest stones. She’d have moved all men, all living things for sure: but I was neither man nor living, as once before. What joy can deaf ears have when Phemis sings? What joy can blind Thamyras have in painted things? But what silent delights my mind invented! What did I not imagine, all the various ways! But still my sex lay there prematurely dead,shamefully, limper than a rose picked yesterday – Look, now, he’s lively at the wrong time, able, now he’s demanding work and service. Why can’t you lie down modestly, worst part of me?You’ve caught me like this with your promises before.You failed your master: I was left weaponless, through you,enduring sad hurt and great embarrassment. Not even this did my girl disdain to try, to rouse me with her gently moving hand: but when she couldn’t make me rise, with her art, and saw it sink down there, ignoring her, ‘Why toy with me, why, if you’re sick,’ she said, ‘did you invite your unwilling body to my bed? Either some Circean sorceress has bewitched you, or you come here wearied by another lover.’ With that, she leapt up, veiled by her loose slip – and how her fleeing naked feet became her! – And lest her servants thought that all was chaste,I scattered water there, to cover the disgrace.

I wanted to highlight my fav parts but the whole thing is my fav part

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