by Coleridge · Cluster: Transience · Decay · Carpe Diem
Abstract
Imitation of Catullus’s ‘Vivamus mea Lesbia’: carpe-diem invitation to love and count kisses, contrasting the recurring sun with humans’ endless night of death.
Connections
Topoi: Carpe Diem, Tempus Fugit Motifs: Sun, Night, Desire Themes & Concepts: Mortality, Romantic Love Forms & Genres: Lyric Historical References: Ancient Rome
Testo integrale / Full text
Vivamus, mea Lesbia, atque amemus.
CATULLUS.
My Lesbia, let us love and live,
And to the winds, my Lesbia, give
Each cold restraint, each boding fear
Of age and all her saws severe.
Yon sun now posting to the main 5
Will set, — but ‘tis to rise again; —
But we, when once our mortal light
Is set, must sleep in endless night.
Then come, with whom alone I’ll live,
A thousand kisses take and give! 10
Another thousand! — to the store
Add hundreds — then a thousand more!
And when they to a million mount,
Let confusion take the account, —
That you, the number never knowing, 15
May continue still bestowing —
That I for joys may never pine,
Which never can again be mine!
? 1794.