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Cras amet qui numquam amavit quique amavit cras amet ! ver novum, ver iam canorum, vere natus orbis est ; vere concordant amores, vere nubunt alites, et nemus comam resolvit de maritis imbribus. cras amorum copulatrix inter umbras arborum implicat casas virentis de flagello myrteo, cras Dione iura dicit fulta sublimi throno. cras amet qui numquam amavit quique amavit cras amet ! tunc cruore de superno spumeo pontus globo caerulas inter catervas, inter et bipedes equos, fecit undantem Dionen de marinis fluctibus. cras amet qui numquam amavit quique amavit cras amet ! ipsa gemmis purpurantem pingit annum floridis ; ipsa surgentes papillas de Favoni spiritu urget in nodos tepentes ; ipsa roris lucidi, noctis aura quem relinquit, spargit umentis aquas. emicant lacrimae trementes de caduco pondere : gutta praeceps orbe parvo sustinet casus suos. en, pudorem florulentae prodiderunt purpurae ! umor ille, quem serenis astra rorant noctibus, mane virgineas papillas solvit umenti peplo. ipsa iussit mane ut udae virgines nubant rosae : facta Cypridis de cruore deque Amoris osculis deque gemmis deque flammis deque solis purpuris cras ruborem, qui latebat veste tectus ignea, unico marita nodo non pudebit solvere. cras amet qui numquam amavit quique amavit cras amet !
About the headline (FAQ)
View text with all available footnotesConfirmed with Catullus, Tibullus, Pervigilium Veneris, Loeb Classical Library 6, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2000, Pages 350-352.
Text Authorship:
- by Anonymous / Unidentified Author, no title [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]
Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):
- by George Lloyd (1913 - 1998), no title, 1979-80 [ soprano , tenor, chorus and orchestra ], from Pervigilium Veneris, no. 1 [sung text checked 1 time]
Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):
- ENG English (Grant Hicks) , copyright © 2026, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
Research team for this page: Grant Hicks [Guest Editor] , Ferdinando Albeggiani
This text was added to the website: 2005-08-14
Line count: 27
Word count: 195
Tomorrow let him love who has never loved, and who has loved, let him love tomorrow! Fresh Spring, already melodious Spring: the world is born in Spring; loves harmonize in Spring, birds wed in Spring, and the forest lets down its hair beneath fertilizing showers. Tomorrow the uniter of loves, among the shadows of the trees, weaves verdant huts of myrtle branches, tomorrow Dione declares the law, seated on her lofty throne. Tomorrow let him love who has never loved, and who has loved, let him love tomorrow! On such a day the sea from a foaming sphere of blood from above among throngs of blue, among two-legged horses, created Dione, surging from the billows of the sea. Tomorrow let him love who has never loved, and who has loved, let him love tomorrow! She herself paints the year purple with flowery jewels; the buds that spring up under the breath of the west wind she herself urges into fruitful swellings; of the shining dew, the exhalation that night leaves behind, she scatters the damp waters. The sparkling tears tremble with their pendent burden: a precarious droplet checks its fall in a tiny orb. Behold, the purple of the flowers has revealed their modesty! That liquid that falls as dew from the stars on clear nights, in the morning opens the virginal buds with a watery cloak. In the morning she herself bade the roses, dewy virgins, to marry: She who was made from Cypriot blood and from Love's kisses and from gems and from flames and from purple sunlight tomorrow her redness, which lurked beneath a fiery garment, wedded with a single bond, will not be ashamed to set free. Tomorrow let him love who has never loved, and who has loved, let him love tomorrow!
About the headline (FAQ)
View text with all available footnotesNote for stanza 2, line 6: Dione was the mother of the goddess Aphrodite, the Greek equivalent of Venus, but in Roman poetry her name was often used to refer to Venus/Aphrodite herself. That is the case here.
Note for stanza 4: In Lloyd's setting no explicit subject is given for the verb fecit ("created") in line 3. There are versions of this poem with an extra line at the beginning of this stanza that provides such a subject, in the form of the phrase primus Aether, and it may be that Lloyd's text is based on some such version. Although Lloyd omitted this line from his setting, the translator has borrowed from it to provide "created" with a subject.
Note for stanza 6, line 11: both "Cypriot" and Lloyd's "Paphian" refer to Venus, who was said to have been born in the city of Paphos on the island of Cyprus.
Text Authorship:
- Translation from Latin to English copyright © 2026 by Grant Hicks, (re)printed on this website with kind permission. To reprint and distribute this author's work for concert programs, CD booklets, etc., you may ask the copyright-holder(s) directly or ask us; we are authorized to grant permission on their behalf. Please provide the translator's name when contacting us.
Contact: licenses@email.lieder.example.net
Based on:
- a text in Latin by Anonymous/Unidentified Artist , no title
This text was added to the website: 2026-01-26
Line count: 27
Word count: 304