Bliss Carman, et al., eds. The World’s Best Poetry.
Volume I. Of Home: of Friendship. 1904. | | | | Poems of Home: V. The Home | | Homeward Bound | | Gaius Valerius Catullus (c. 84–c. 54 B.C.) |
| | From the Latin by Theodore Martin
DEAR Sirmio, that art the very eye | |
| Of islands and peninsulas, that lie | |
| Deeply embosomed in calm inland lake, | |
| Or where the waves of the vast ocean break; | |
| Joy of all joys, to gaze on thee once more! | 5 |
| I scarce believe that I have left the shore | |
| Of Thynia, and Bithynia’s parching plain, | |
| And gaze on thee in safety once again! | |
| Oh, what more sweet than when, from care set free, | |
| The spirit lays its burden down, and we, | 10 |
| With distant travel spent, come home and spread | |
| Our limbs to rest along the wished-for bed! | |
| This, this alone, repays such toils as these! | |
| Smile, then, fair Sirmio, and thy master please,— | |
| And you, ye dancing waters of the lake, | 15 |
| Rejoice; and every smile of home awake! | | | | |
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