The Complete Poetry of John Milton (16 page)

ON THE COMING OF SPRING

In his perpetual cycle Time, rolling back, / now recalls fresh zephyrs, with warming spring. / And the restored earth is covered with brief youth / and now the ground, free from frost, is becoming delightfully green. / Am I mistaken? or are powers returning to my songs, [5] / and is inspiration present in me by the favor of spring? / It is present by the favor of spring, and again begins to flourish from it / (who may suspect?) and even now demands some work for itself. / The cleft Castalian peak
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hovers before my eyes / and dreams transport Pyrene
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to me
in the night. [10] / And my excited breast enflames me with its strange emotion, / and I am made delirious, and a divine sound agitates me from within. / Apollo himself appears—I see his locks entwined / with Daphne’s laurel—Apollo himself is descended.
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/ Now my mind is snatched from me into the heights of the liquid sky, [15] / and through the wandering clouds I fly, free from my body. / And through shadows and through caves, the sanctuaries of the poets, / I am borne, and to me the secret temples of the gods are accessible. / My spirit observes all that is done on Olympus, / and the hidden infernal regions do not escape my eyes. [20] / What does my soul sing so sublimely from its full mouth? / What does this madness bring forth, what this sacred rage? / Spring which has furnished me inspiration shall be sung through it; / her returned gifts may have been profitable in this way. / Already, Philomela,
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you are beginning your modulations, hidden [25] / by the young leaves, while all the grove is still. / I in the city, you in the wood, let us both begin together / and together let each sing the coming of spring. / Ho! changes of spring have returned; let us celebrate the hours / of spring, and let the unfailing Muse take this task upon herself. [30] / Now the sun, fleeing the Ethiopians and the fields of Tithonus, / directs his golden reins toward Arctos’ lands.
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/ Brief is the journey of night, brief is the delay of dark night; / that dreadful one lives in exile with her shadows. / And now Lycaonian Boötes,
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wearied, does not follow [35] / in his celestial wain over the course as before; / now even few stars keep their accustomed watch / about the courts of Jove throughout the entire sky. / For deceit and slaughter and violence retired with the night; / neither have the gods feared the wickedness of the giants.
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[40] / Perhaps some shepherd, reclining on the top of a cliff / while the dewy earth reddens with the first sunlight, / asserts, “Then, certainly on this night were you deprived, / Apollo, of your love who would delay your swift steeds.” / Delighted, Cynthia
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returns to her forests, and resumes her quiver, [45] / when she
sees
on high the wheels of Lucifer, / and setting down her feeble beams she seems to be happy / that her task is made short by her brother’s power. / Abandon, Apollo says, your aged wedlock, Aurora; / What is pleasing in having
lain stretched out on an impotent bed?
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[50] / Aeolides,
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the hunter, awaits you on the green lawn. / Arise; high Hymettus
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enjoys your fires. / With modest face the blushing goddess confesses her guilt, / and drives her morning horses more swiftly. / The reviving earth shakes off her hated old age [55] / and wishes to submit to your embraces, Apollo. / Not only does she wish them, but she is worthy of them; for what is / more beautiful than she, as, voluptuous, she bares her all-bearing breasts / and breathes the harvests of Arabia, and from her elegant mouth / pours gentle fragrances with Paphian roses? [60] / Behold, her lofty brow is crowned by a sacred wood / just as a piny tower encompasses Idaean Ops,
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/ and she twines her dewy locks with various bloom / and with her flowers she is seen able to please, / just as the Sicilian goddess, wreathed round her flowing locks with flowers, [65] / was pleasing to the Taenarian god.
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/ Look, Apollo, facile loves are calling you / and vernal winds blow honey-sweet pleas. / Odor-bearing Zephyrus gently claps his cinnamon-scented wings / and the birds seem to carry their flatteries to you. [70] / The thoughtless earth does not seek your loves without dowry, / nor does she beg desired marriage, as if in need; / bounteous, she offers you health-bearing grain for medical uses / and hence she herself supports your titles.
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/ Because if money, if glittering gifts impress you [75] / (love is often bought with gifts), / she holds out to you whatever wealth conceals / under the broad sea and under the overthrown mountains. / Ah, how often when, wearied by steep Olympus, / you would sink into the western seas, [80] / does she say, Why should the blue mother receive you, / Apollo, fainting from your daily course into her Hesperian waters? / What have you to do with Tethys?
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with Tartessian streams? / Why do you bathe your divine face in the filthy brine? / You will entrap coolness much better in my shadow, Apollo. [85] / Come hither, moisten your glittering locks in the dew; / a gentler sleep will come to you in the chill grass. / Come hither and place your rays on my bosom; / wheresoever you lie about, a gently murmuring breeze will soothe / our bodies spread on humid roses. [90] / A destiny like Semele’s
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(believe me) does not frighten
me, / nor the axle smoking from Phaeton’s horse. / When you, Apollo, use your fire more wisely, / come hither and place your rays on my bosom. / Thus wanton Earth breathes out her loves; [95] / her remaining throng rush to ruin by example of the mother. / For now wandering Cupid runs through all the world, / and sustains his dying torches by the flame of the sun. / The lethal horns of his bow resound with new strings, / the tremulous arrows glitter severely with new iron. [100] / And now he attempts to subdue even the invincible Diana, / whoever sits in the sacred hearth by the chaste Vesta. / Venus herself annually refreshes her aging form, / and is believed sprung anew from the warm sea. / Through the marble cities the youth cry aloud, Hymen; [105] / the shore and hollow rocks echo, Io, Hymen. / He appears more elegant and more becoming in proper dress; / his odorous attire diffuses the perfume of purple crocus. / And many a girl with her virgin breasts encircled with gold / comes forth to the inward joys of lovely spring. [110] / Each is her own vow; one vow of all is the same, / that Cytherea will give her the man whom she desires. / Now also the shepherd is making music on his sevenfold reed pipe / and Phyllis has songs which she joins to his. / The sailor calms his stars with nocturnal song [115] / and calls the swift dolphins to the surface of the shallows.
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/ Jove sports himself on high Olympus with his spouse / and assembles the servile gods to his feast. / Now even the satyrs, when the evening shadows rise, / flit about through the flowery fields in a swift dance, [120] / and Sylvanus girded with his cypress foliage, / and the god half-goat and the goat half-god. / The Dryads who have lurked under the ancient trees / wander through the mountains and the lonely fields. / Maenalian Pan revels through the crops and the thickets; [125] / hardly mother Cybele, hardly Ceres is safe from him; / and lustful Faunus ravishes some Oread, / while the nymph reflects to herself on trembling feet. / And now she lies hidden, and lurking she wishes to be seen poorly concealed, / and she flees, and fleeing she may wish herself to be made captive. [130] / The gods also do not hesitate to prefer the woods to heaven, / and every grove possesses its own deities. / Long may every grove possess its own deities; / ye gods, I pray, do not go from your arboreal home! / May the golden age restore you, Jove, to a wretched world! [135] / Why do you come back with your cruel weapons in the clouds? / At least drive your swift team, Apollo, as leisurely / as you can, and may the time of spring pass slowly; / and may foul winter bring prolonged nights tardily, / and may shadow attack later within our heavens. [140]