Journal of Italian Translation

Joseph Tusiani/Ugo Foscolo
that firsts inhabited those very worlds
felt soon the empire of their deity.
But with no deity, forlorn and lost
the little globe of this our earth lay still
with all its children born for war and prey
and, after a brief season, doomed to die.
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The fair approaching chariot and the harsh
fate that had struck their neighbors in a flash
taught the Laconians more peaceful arts.
Untrodden forests and the ocean bed
until that very day had kept them all
utterly sundered from the rest of Greece;
but as they raised an altar to the Gods
opulence, regal banquets, and love jousts
at once they knew, and soon from everywhere
princes of Argos, warriors of Asia
hastened to Leda’s court. Why did you then
yield, Love, to anger? If you still afflict
the Graces so, how will you win my heart?
Sweet ways and idle bliss were born of you,
who also stirred the senses with such lust
as brooded treason ‘gainst the Greeks at once.
To save themselves from all your might, O Love,
stark-naked maidens with great toil and sweat
hardened their limbs in fighting manliness.
And yet, so long as envy failed to force you
against the Graces, your own sisters, Sparta
flourished in splendor. Here was Pharae’s gulf,
around which dolphins find their sounding dens.
Yea, Sparta with Eurota’s streams was here—
swans’ cherished home; and here Messene lent
safe refuge in her woods to turtle-doves;
here, too, was seen Augeas’ little sea
never by fishermen disturbed again
since shading myrtle trees around it grew—
the bathing spot for Leda’s beauteous form
and for her divine daughter’s dainty limbs.
Nor could Amyclae, land of wreaths, provide
as many buds as there were virgin brides:
the grooms, a-singing, to the nuptials came,
for neither love of dauntless steeds nor Las,
where at the foot of three high mountains sprang
Diana’s rituals and hunting chase,
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