Classic Poem

Lo , on the shining lake green Sirmio glows like a jewel,
The flower of all peninsulas,

Gazed at, caressed by the sun: like a mighty goblet of silver,
Benacus wide encircles it.

Fringed are the gleaming shores with quiet olives and copses
Of everlasting laurel-trees.

This is the radiant cup by Mother Italy proffered
With arms uplifted to the Gods;

And from high heaven the Gods let Sirmio drop on the water,
The gem of all peninsulas.

Lovely she is; and Baldo, yon fatherly mountain, protects her
With stormy eyebrows from above:

Mongü lies like a fallen Titan, her champion in battle;
Supine he lies, yet threatening still.

Over against him Salo from her moon-shaped gulf to the leftward
Extends her white arms o'er the lake,

E'en as a blithesome maiden that enters the dance and abandons
Her veil and tresses to the wind,

Laughingly scattering handfuls of flowers, adorning with flowers
Her maiden brow exultantly.

Yonder below lifts Garda her gloomy rock o'er the water
Extended mirror-like beneath,

Chanting a saga of ancient towns long buried and vanished,
And tales of fair barbarian queens.

Nay, but, Lalage, here, whence the bountiful spaces of azure
Entrance thine eyes and soothe thy soul.

Here did Valerius Catullus below on the glistening pebbles
Once moor his swift Bithynian bark;

Here hath he sat long days, and Lesbia's eyes in the water
Phosphorescent and tremulous,

Yea, and Lesbia's treacherous smile and numberless graces,
Hath gazed at in the glassy flood,

While in the gloomy alleys of Rome fair Lesbia languished
Among the sons of Romulus.

Then from those liquid depths the lake-nymph called to him, singing:
" Come, O Quintus Valerius!

" Here, too, our grottos are bright with the sun, but diffused are the sunbeams
Silvery soft like Cynthia's.

" Here doth the ceaseless roar of your life sink low, till it seemeth
A far-off murmur as of bees.

" Madness and fretful care are soothed in the cool and the silence,
And fade in slow forgetfulness.

" Sweet is it here to slumber while softly the musical chorus
Of azure virgins charms the ear,

" While pure Hesperus lengthens his rosy torch on the water
And wavelets sob upon the beach."

Ah, sad Love! He hateth the Muses, and wantonly tortures
All poets with tragic cruelty.

And yet, who from thine eyes and thy warfare of amorous glances
Can feel secure, my Lalage?

Pluck for the stainless Muses three boughs of laurel and myrtle,
And wave them to th' eternal Sun.

Seist thou not the flocks of white swans float from Peschiera
Adown the silv'ry Mincio?

Hearest thou not from the verdant meadows, where sleepeth Bianor,
The sound of Roman Virgil's voice?

Lalage, turn and adore! From the Scaligers' tower above thee
Looks forth a face austere and grand:

" Up in beautiful Italy — " smiling he murmurs, and gazes
On waters, earth, and azure air.