“I would not think to touch the sky with two arms”

“Eros once again limb-loosener whirls me sweetbitter, impossible to fight off, creature stealing up...I don't know what I should do: two states of mind in me...”

“Some say an army of horsemen,some of footsoldiers, some of ships,is the fairest thing on the black earth,but I say it is what one loves.It's very easy to make this clearto everyone, for Helen,by far surpassing mortals in beauty,left the best of all husbandsand sailed to Troy,mindful of neither her childnor her dear parents, butwith one glimpse she was seduced byAphrodite. For easily bent...and nimbly...[missing text]...has reminded me nowof Anactoria who is not here;I would much prefer to see the lovelyway she walks and the radiant glance of her facethan the war-chariots of the Lydians ortheir footsoldiers in arms.”

“The gleaming stars all about the shining moonHide their bright faces, when full-orbed and splendidIn the sky she floats, flooding the shadowed earth with clear silver light.”

“yet if you had a desire for good or beautiful thingsand your tongue were not concocting some evil to sayshame would not hold down your eyesbut rather you would speak about what is just”

“Live for the gifts the fragrant-breasted Musessend, for the clear, the singing, lyre, my children.Old age freezes my body, once so lithe,rinses the darkness from my hair, now white.My heart’s heavy, my knees no longer keep meup through the dance they used to prance like fawns in.Oh, I grumble about it, but for what?Nothing can stop a person’s growing old.They say that Tithonus was swept awayin Dawn’s passionate, rose-flushed arms to liveforever, but he lost his looks, his youth,failing husband of an immortal bride.”

“Girls, be good to these spirits of music and poetrythat breast your threshold with their scented gifts.Lift the lyre, clear and sweet, they leave with you.As for me, this body is now so arthriticI cannot play, hardly even hold the instrument.Can you believe my white hair was once black?And oh, the soul grows heavy with the body.Complaining knee-joints creak at every move.To think I danced as delicate as a deer!Some gloomy poems came from these thoughts:useless: we are all born to lose life,and what is worse, girls, to lose youth.The legend of the goddess of the dawnI’m sure you know: how rosy Eosmadly in love with gorgeous young Tithonusswept him like booty to her hiding-placebut then forgot he would grow old and greywhile she in despair pursued her immortal way.”