Wednesday, August 20, 2008

Westron Wynde (elegiac poem)

Westron Wynde, when wilt thou blow
The small raine down can raine
Cryst, if my love were in my arms
and I in my bedde again!

O, Zephyre, flabunt quando tibi leniter aurae?
(imbre Iovi parco tum liceat pluere*!)
O, molli si iterum in lecto versarer, amatam
amplexu possem continuisse meam!
____________
*
vel addas tingere tum liceat (Chris Jones).

O Western Wind, when will your breezes gently blow?
(then let it be permitted to Jove
to rain down with sparing rain!)
O, if only I were once again in my soft bed,
and able to hold my beloved
in my embrace!



2 comments:

Chris Jones said...

Quite enjoyed your "Work in Progress" on the Westron Wynde and posted on it at my blog. I preferred the couplet you adopted in the final, but wonder what you might think of tingere tum liceat for the last half of the pentameter, a phrase which IMO avoids the repetition imbre...pluere. Not a criticism, just a thought; your poem stands fine as it is.

Peter Lech said...

Love it! Also, I think licet alicui tingere is better Latin than l. a. pluere...

Thanks!