Erotica Romana

Erotica Romana
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Erotica Romana

I

Here's where I've planted my garden and here I shall care for love's blossoms —
As I am taught by my muse, carefully sort them in plots:
Fertile branches, whose product is golden fruit of my lifetime,
Set here in happier years, tended with pleasure today.
You, stand here at my side, good Priapus – albeit from thieves I've
Nothing to fear. Freely pluck, whosoever would eat.
– Hypocrites, those are the ones! If weakened with shame and bad conscience
One of those criminals comes, squinting out over my garden,
Bridling at nature's pure fruit, punish the knave in his hindparts,
Using the stake which so red rises there at your loins.

II

Tell me ye stones and give me O glorious palaces answer.
Speak O ye streets but one word. Genius, art thou alive?
Yes, here within thy sanctified walls there's a soul in each object,
ROMA eternal. For me, only, are all things yet mute.
Who will then tell me in whispers and where must I find just the window
Where one day she'll be glimpsed: creature who'll scorch me with love?
Can't I divine yet the paths through which over and over
To her and from her I'll go, squandering valuable time?
Visiting churches and palaces, all of the ruins and the pillars,
I, a responsible man, profit from making this trip.
With my business accomplished, ah, then shall only one temple,
AMOR's temple alone, take the initiate in.
Rome, thou art a whole world, it is true, and yet without love this
World would not be the world, Rome would cease to be Rome.

III

More than ever I dreamed, I have found it: my happy good fortune!
Cupid sagaciously led past those palazzos so fine.
He of course knows very well (and I have also discovered)
What, beneath tapestries rich, gilded boudoirs conceal.
One may if one wishes call him a blind, wanton boy – but I know you,
Clever Cupid, too well! O, incorruptible god!
We were by no means inveigled to enter façades so majestic;
Somber cortilé we passed, balcony high and gallant,
Hastening onward until an humble but exquisite portal
Offered a refuge to both, ardent seeker and guide.
Here he provides me with ev'rything, sees that I get what I call for;
Each day that passes he spreads freshly plucked roses for me.
– Isn't that heaven on earth? Say, beautiful Lady Borghese,
What would you give to me more? – You, Nipotina, what yours?
Banquets and game tables, operas, balls, promenades down the Corso?
These but deprive my sweet boy of his most opportune times.
Finery, haughtiness do not entice me. Does one not lift a
Gown of the finest brocade just as one lifts common wool?
If she's to press in comfort a lover against that soft bosom,
Doesn't he want her to be free from all brooches and chains?
Must not the jewelry, and then the lace and the bustles and whalebone
All of it come off entire, if he's to learn how she feels?
I encounter no troubles like those. Simple dress of rough homespun,
At but a lover's mere touch, tumbles in folds to the floor.
Quickly he carries the girl as she's clad in chemise of coarse linen —
Just as a nursemaid might, playfully up to her bed.
Drapings of satin are absent; the mattress is quite unembroidered.
Large is this room where the bed offers its comfort for two.
Jupiter's welcome to more from his Juno if he can get it;
Let any mortal find rest, softer, wherever he can.
We are content with Cupid's delights, authentic and naked —
And with the exquisite creak /crack of the bed as it rocks.

IV

Ask whomever you will but you'll never find out where I'm lodging,
High society's lords, ladies so groomed and refined.
"Tell me, was Werther authentic? Did all of that happen in real life?"
"Lotte, oh where did she live, Werther's only true love?"
How many times have I cursed those frivolous pages that broadcast
Out among all mankind passions I felt in my youth!
Were he my brother, why then I 'd have murdered poor Werther.
Yet his despondent ghost couldn't have sought worse revenge.
That's the way "Marlborough," the ditty, follows the Englishman's travels
Down to Livorno from France, thence from Livorno to Rome,
All of the way into Naples and then, should he flee on to Madras,
"Marlborough" will surely be there, "Marlborough" sung in the port.
Happily now I've escaped, and my mistress knows Werther and Lotte
Not a whit better than who might be this man in her bed:
That he's a foreigner, footloose and lusty, is all she could tell you,
Who beyond mountains and snow, dwelt in a house made of wood.

V

Do not, beloved, regret that you yielded to me so quickly:
I entertain no base, insolent thoughts about you.
Arrows of Cupid work divers effects. Some do but scratch us:
Slow and insidious these poison our hearts over years.
Yet with a head freshly honed and cunningly fledged, certain others
Pierce to the marrow, inflame rapidly there our blood.
When gods and goddesses in days of heroes made love, then