1, 2a, 2b, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9

10, 11, 12, 13, 14a, 14b, 15, 16, 17

Poem 15:  Radishes and mullets

Commendo tibi me ac meos amores,

Aureli. ueniam peto pudentem,

ut, si quicquam animo tuo cupisti,

quod castum expeteres et integellum,

conserues puerum mihi pudice,

non dico a populo – nihil ueremur

istos, qui in platea modo huc modo illuc

in re praetereunt sua occupati,

uerum a te metuo tuoque pene

infesto pueris bonis malisque.

quem tu qua lubet, ut lubet moueto

quantum uis, ubi erit foris paratum:

hunc unum excipio, ut puto, pudenter.

quod si te mala mens furorque uecors

in tantam impulerit, sceleste, culpam,

ut nostrum insidiis caput lacessas.

a tum te miserum malique fati!

quem attractis pedibus patente porta

percurrent raphanique mugilesque.

Aurelius, I commend to you me and

my love. I’m looking for a modest indulgence:

that if you’ve ever longed for in your heart

anything you demanded pure and unspoilt,

you’ll keep my boyfriend safe and virtuous.                     5

I don’t say safe from the public – we’re not

in fear of those who pass now here, now there

on the street preoccupied with their own business –

but, in truth, I’m afraid of you and your penis,

a danger to both good and naughty boys!                     10

Excite it where and how you please, as much

as you want out of doors, where it’ll be primed:

I, modestly (so I suppose), exempt this one.

But if malicious intent and insane passion

compel you, villain, into such temptation                       15

that you challenge our person with your plots,

ah then, pity on you for an evil end.

With feet drawn apart, and an open door,

radishes and mullets will run through you!

Notes
For Aurelius, see Poem 11. ‘My boyfriend’ is probably Juventius. ‘With feet drawn apart, and an open door, radishes and mullets will run through you’ refers to a traditional punishment in Ancient Greece for adultery (there’s a reference to radish-buggering in Aristophanes’ play The Clouds). See Poem 16 for similar obscenities directed against Aurelius.

The Latin metre is hendecasyllables; the English metre is iambic pentameters, flexibly applied, particularly in the last line, where four trochees are used to emphasise the threatening nature of the words.