That I may enjoy in very truth the greeting you have sent in words, Leander, O come! Long to me is all delay that defers our joys. Forgive me what I say—I cannot be patient for love! We burn with equal fires, but I am not equal to you in strength; men, methinks, must have stronger natures. As the body, so is the soul of tender women frail—delay but a little longer, and I shall die!
You men, now in the chase, and now husband-ing the genial acres of the country, consume long hours in the varied tasks that keep you. Either the market-place holds you, or the sports of the supple wrestling-ground, or you turn with bit the neck of the responsive steed; now you take the bird with the snare, now the fish with the hook; and the later hours you while away with the wine before you. For me who am denied these things, even were I less fiercely aflame, there is nothing left to do but love. What there is left, I do; and you, O sole delight of mine, I love with even greater love than could be returned to me! Either with my dear nurse I whisper of you, and marvel what can keep you from your way; or, looking forth upon the sea, I chide the billows stirred by the hateful wind, in words almost your own; or, when the heavy wave has a little laid aside its fierce mood. I complain that you indeed could come, but will not; and while I complain tears coui’se from the eyes that love you, and the ancient dame who shares my secret dries them with tremulous hand. Often I look to see whether your footprints are on the shore, as if the sand would keep the marks impressed on it; and, that I may inquire about you, and write to you, I still am asking if anyone has come from Abydos, or if anyone is going to Abydos. Why tell how many times I kiss the garments you lay aside when making ready to stem the waters of the Hellespont?
Thus, when the light is done and night’s more friendly hour has driven out day and set forth the gleaming stars, straightway I place in the highest of our abode my Watchful lamps, the signals to guide you on the accustomed way. Then, drawing with whirling spindle the twisted thread, with woman’s art we beguile the slow hours of waiting.
What, meanwhile, I say through so long a time, you ask? Naught but Leander’s name is on my lips. “Do you think my joy has already come forth from his home, my nurse? or are all waking, and does he fear his kin? Now do you think he is putting off the robe from his shoulders, and now rubbing the rich oil into his limbs?” She signs assent, most likely; not that she cares for my kisses, but slumber creeps upon her and lets nod her ancient head. Then, after slightest pause, “Now surely he is setting forth on his voyage,” I say, “and is parting the waters with the stroke of his pliant arms.” And when I have finished a few strands and the spindle has touched the ground, I ask whether you can be mid way of the strait. And now I look forth, and now in timid tones I pray that a favouring breeze will give you an easy course; my ears catch at uncertain notes, and at every sound I am sure that you have come.
When the greatest part of the night has gone by for me in such delusions, sleep steals upon my wearied eyes. Perhaps, false one, you yet pass the night with me, though against your will; perhaps you come, though yourself you do not wish to come. For now I seem to see you already swimming near, and now to feel your wet arms about my neck, and now to throw about your dripping limbs the accustomed coverings, and now to warm our bosoms in the close embrace—and many things else a modest tongue should say naught of, whose memory delights, but whose telling brings a blush. All me! brief pleasures these, and not the truth; for you are ever wont to go when slumber goes. O more firmly let our eager loves be knit, and our joys be faithful and true! Why have I passed so many cold and lonely nights? Why, O tardy loiterer, are you so often away from me? The sea, I grant, is not yet fit for the swimmer; but yesternight the gale was gentler. Why did you let it pass? Why did you fear what was not to come? Why did so fair a night go by for naught, and you not seize upon the way? Grant that like chance for coming be given you soon; this chance was the better, surely, since ’twas the earlier.
But swiftly, you may say, the face of the storm-tossed deep was changed. Yet you often come in less time, when you are in haste. Overtaken here, you would have, methinks, no reason to complain, and while you held me close no storm would harm you. I surely should hear the sounding winds with joy, and should pray for the waters never to be calm. But what has come to pass, that you are grown more fearful of the wave, and dread the sea you before despised? For I call to mind your coming once when the flood was not less fierce and threatening—or not much less; When I cried to you: “Be ever rash with such good fortune, lest wretched I may have to weep for your courage!” Whence this new fear, and whither has that boldness fled? Where is that mighty swimmer who scorned the waters?
But no, be rather as you are than as you were wont to be before; make your way when the sea is placid, and be safe—so you are only the same, so we only love each other, as you write, and that flame of ours turn not to chill ashes. I do not fear so much the winds that hinder my vows as I fear that like the wind your love may wander—that I may not be worth it all, that your perils may outweigh their cause, and I seem a reward too slight for your toils.
Sometimes I fear my birthplace may injure me, and I be called no match, a Thracian maid, for a husband from Abydos. Yet could I bear with greater patience all things else than have you linger in the bonds of some mistress’s charms, see other arms clasped round your neck, and a new love end the love we bear. Ah, may I rather perish than be wounded by such a crime, may fate overtake me ere you incur that guilt! I do not say these words because you have given sign that such grief will come to me, or because some recent tale has made me anxious, but because I fear everything—for who that loved was ever free from care? The fears of the absent, too, are multiplied by distance. Happy they whom their own presence bids know the true charge, and forbids to fear the false! Me wrongs imaginary fret, while the real I cannot know, and either error stirs equal gnawings in my heart. O, would you only come! or did I only know that the wind, or your father—at least, no woman—kept you back! Were it a woman, and I should know, I should die of grieving, believe me; sin against me at once, if you desire my death!
But you will not sin against me, and my fears of such troubles are vain. The reason you do not come is the jealous storm that beats you back. Ah, wretched me! with what great waves the shores are beaten, and what dark clouds envelop and hide the day! It may be the loving mother of Helle has come to the sea, and is lamenting in down-pouring tears the drowning of her child—or is the step-dame, turned to a goddess of the waters, vexing the sea that is called by her step-child’s hated name? This place, such as ’tis now, is aught but friendly to tender maids; by these waters Helle perished, by them my own affliction comes. Yet, Neptune, wert thou mindful of thine own heart’s flames, thou oughtst let no love be hindered by the winds—if neither Amymone, nor Tyro much bepraised for beauty, are stories idly charged to thee, nor shining Alcyone, and Calyce, child of Hecataeon, nor Medusa when her locks were not yet twined with snakes, nor golden-haired Laodice and Celaeno taken to the skies, nor those whose names I mind me of having read.
These, surely, Neptune, and many more, the poets say in their songs have mingled their soft embraces with thine own. Why, then, dost thou, who hast felt so many times the power of love, close up with whirling storm the way we have learned to know? Spare us, impetuous one, and mingle thy battles out upon the open deep! These waters, that separate two lands, are scant. It befits thee, who art mighty, either to toss about the mighty keel, or to be fierce even with entire fleets; ’tis shame for the god of the great sea to terrify a swimming youth—that glory is less than should come from troubling any pond. Noble he is, to be sure, and of a famous stock, but he does not trace his line from the Ulysses thou dost not trust. Have mercy on him, and save us both! It is he who swims, but the limbs of Leander and all my hopes hang on the selfsame wave.
My lamp has sputtered, see!—for I am writing with it near—it has sputtered and given us favouring sign. Look, nurse is pouring drops into auspicious fires. “To-morrow,” she says, “we shall be more,” and herself drinks of the wine. Ah, do make us more, glide over the conquered wave, O you whom I have welcomed to all my inmost heart! Come back to camp, deserter of your ally love; why must I lay my limbs in the mid space of my couch? There is naught for you to fear! Venus’ self will smile upon your venture; child of the sea, the paths of the sea she will make smooth. Oft am I prompted myself to go through the midst of the waves, but ’tis the wont of this strait to be safer for men. For why, though Phrixus and Phrixus’ sister both rode this way, did the maiden alone give name to these wide waters?
Perhaps you fear the time may fail you for return, or you may not endure the effort of the twofold toil. Then let us both from diverse ways come together in mid sea, and give each other kisses on the waters’ crest, and so return again each to his own town; ’twill be little, but more than naught! Would that either this shame that compels us to secret loving would cease, or else the love that fears men’s speech. Now, two things that ill go together, passion and regard for men, are at strife. Which I shall follow is in doubt; the one becomes, the other delights. Once had Jason of Pagasae entered Colchis, and he set the maid of the Phasis in his swift ship and bore her off; once had the lover from Ida come to Lacedaemon, and he straight returned together with his prize. But you, as oft as you seek your love, so oft you leave her, and whene’er ’tis peril for boats to go, you swim.
Yet, O my young lover, though victor over the swollen waters, so spurn the sea as still to be in fear of it! Ships wrought with skill are overwhelmed by the wave; do you think your arms more powerful than oars? What you are eager for, Leander—to swim—is the sailor’s fear; ’tis that follows ever on the wreck of ships. Ah, wretched me! I am eager not to persuade you to what I urge; may you be too strong, I pray, to yield to my admonition—only so you come to me, and cast about my neck the wearied arms oft beaten by the wave!
But, as often as I turn my face toward the dark blue wave, my fearful breast is seized by some hidden chill. Nor am I the less perturbed by a dream I had yesternight, though I have cleared myself of its threat by sacrifice. For, just before dawn, when my lamp was already dying down, at the time when dreams are wont to be true, my fingers were relaxed by sleep, the threads fell from them, and I laid my head down upon the pillow to rest. There in vision clear I seemed to see a dolphin swimming through the wind-tossed waters; and after the flood had cast it forth upon the thirsty sands, the wave, and at the same time life, abandoned the unhappy thing. Whatever it may mean, I fear; and you—nor smile at my dreams, nor trust your arms except to a tranquil sea! If you spare not yourself, spare the maid beloved by you, who never will be safe unless you are so! I have hope none (the less that the waves are broken and peace is near; do you cleave their paths while placid with all your might! Meanwhile, since the billows will not let the swimmer come, let the letter that I send you soften the hated hours of delay.
Cite This Text