dowry to sneer at. Daddy needn’t owe
anything to my man. Oh, idiot—
the sentinels! Think you can simply strut
through the gates to the Cretan camp? The sentinels
are too diligent. You’ll find no lulls
in their vigilance, and they can’t even slide
the bolt—poor daddy’s one earned cause for pride.
To think my life depends on a senile lush!
Gods, I would love you, and each day I’d rush
to drag unspotted oxen through the mud
and rubricate your altars with fresh blood
if you permitted me to clear that gate—
or, even better, just eradicate
my paternity. . . . Enough pathetic pleas!
Fortune denies the beggar on her knees:
whoever prays for what she cannot steal
insults the life she wastes to moan and kneel.
Become your god! Suppose that any other
woman in love as badly as you would smother
passion with prudence? No. Whoever tried
to keep her from her love would have to ride
her anger to the bloody end. But who
is she, a mere hypothesis, to outdo
Scylla, who’ll walk through fire, who’ll run through swords!