Only a single kiss for these lips and then, O Theseus, leave her;

Look at her eyes--she's awake! Now you're eternally bound.


XVI

Boy, won't you light me a lamp. "But dear master, there's light in the sky yet.

Don't waste your oil and the wick. Don't close the shutters so soon.

Only the houses are blocking the sun there, it's not yet the mountains.

Until the curfew shall ring, full half an hour must pass."

Wretched young fellow, be gone and obey me! My loved one is coming.

Lamplight, console me till then, harbinger warm of the night.


XVII

Poets of old in chorus cried out against those two serpents,

Making them horrible names, hated in all of the world:

Python the one, the other the Hydra of Lerna. These monsters

Both have now been destroyed, thanks to the deeds of the gods.