Latin Poems - Poems about Latin

Mojito Conjuring When the bruja in the red dress sends me out this time, it is for the taste of sour oranges and garlic. Once, when I plied her with a cigar called Hoyo de Montyerrey, she coiled the smoke, said that I was still feral and untamed, sent me out for sugar so that I could learn my true name. Scythe-swinging, field-slave-singing,...

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Hildegard of Bingen, aka the Sibyl of the Rhine, was a German christian mystic who had visions of the Love of God beginning at age three. “Cry out, therefore, and compose!”—Hildegard von Bingen, Scivias, translation by Michael R. Burch HILDEGARD VON BINGEN TRANSLATIONS I behold you, noble, glorious and complete Woman, locus of innocence and purity, the Sacred Matrix in whom...

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Flying in On blankets Shoes And Hair Copied from the land Most repeated Where I stand As a visitor to the southern lands Bird feathers Water And trees A feast...

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O, Sapientia, Mistress of Our Soul, Effulgent glory of eternal light Spin the wheel of life that you govern Ordering all within the moonlit night. O come, fairest Sapientia, lead us into day With saving hand, on heaven's sacred way....

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These are English translations by of Latin poems written by the ancient Roman female poet Sulpicia. V. Reproach for Indifference by Sulpicia translation by Michael R. Burch Have you no kind thoughts for your girl, Cerinthus, now that fever wilts my wasting body? If not, why would I want to conquer this disease, knowing you no longer desired my existence? After all, what’s...

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English translations of Latin poems written by the ancient Roman poetess Sulpicia. I. At Last, Love! by Sulpicia translation by Michael R. Burch It's come at last! Love! The kind of love that, had it remained veiled, would have shamed me more than baring my naked soul. I appealed to Aphrodite in my poems and she delivered my beloved to me, placed him snugly,...

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oh crackle fire let flame and quell a sound, this sound upon such spell that cast a tone to ear nearby and changed by cheek and timely sigh along down track and hoof-fall tread at mid of night and wandering dead a single player wrote this eve with harp to mouth, oh crackled weave that to himself came lost in dust ‘neath the shadow...

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–For Laura Tandem means finally. Latin wordplay. But here it means mirroring But not. Cloning But not Having a bosom friend, A storm sister, an exit buddy. –From OJ ...

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CATULLUS TRANSLATIONS 4 Catullus LXV aka Carmina 65 loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch Hortalus, I’m exhausted by relentless grief, and have thus abandoned the learned virgins; nor can my mind, so consumed by malaise, partake of the Muses' mete fruit; for lately the Lethaean flood laves my brother's death-pale foot with its dark waves, where, beyond mortal sight, ghostly Ilium disgorges souls beneath...

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Watch your Latin and don't let the cat in Caesar had some jam for tea, Pompei aderat. ille, illa, illud, but I'll have Yorkshire pud. amo, amas, amat Who let in the cat? hic, haec, hoc The mouse ran up the clock. You can add another item ad infinitum....

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CATULLUS TRANSLATIONS 3 Catullus VII: 'How Many Kisses' loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch You ask, Lesbia, how many kisses are enough, or more than enough, to satisfy me? As many as the Libyan sands swirling in incense-bearing Cyrene between the torrid oracle of Jove and the sacred tomb of Battiades. Or as many as the stars observing amorous men making love furtively on a...

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CATULLUS TRANSLATIONS 2 Catullus CI: 'His Brother's Burial' translation by Michael R. Burch 1. Through many lands and over many seas I have journeyed, brother, to these wretched rites, to this final acclamation of the dead... and to speak — however ineffectually — to your voiceless ashes now that Fate has wrested you away from me. Alas, my dear brother, wrenched from my arms...

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CATULLUS TRANSLATIONS Catullus LXXXV: 'Odi et Amo' loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch 1. I hate. I love. You ask, 'Why not refrain?' I wish I could explain. I can't, but feel the pain. 2. I hate. I love. Why? Heavens above! I wish I could explain. I can't, but feel the pain. 3. I hate. I love. How can that be, turtledove? I wish I could explain. I can't, but feel...

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Waiting at the window In the upper floor red brick Through glaze oxidized opaquely With grime that has grown thick From eary day she arrives at post The arc begun at easternmost She watches the light progress At noon she dines a simple meal that to her holds no real appeal Around she moves it on her plate And soon is quite the mess Throughout her...

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GILDAS TRANSLATIONS These are modern English translations of Latin poems by the English monk Gildas Sapiens (“Gildas the Wise”). “Alas! The nature of my complaint is the widespread destruction of all that was good, followed by the wild proliferation of evil throughout the land. Normally, I would grieve with my motherland in her travail and rejoice...

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