Pervigilium Veneris (The Vigil of Venus)

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love. Spring is young, spring now is singing, spring is the world reborn. In spring the loves make accord, in spring the birds mate, and the woodland loosens her tresses under nuptial showers.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

To-morrow the marriage-maker of the loves amid shadows of trees weaves her verdurous bowers of myrtle-spray; to-morrow she leads her bands on festival in the singing forests : to-morrow Dione declares her laws high enthroned aloft.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

To-morrow will be the day when the primal ether joined wedlock : then from the moisture overhead and the orbed sea-foam, amid green multitudes and finned horses, sprang Dione wave-born under nuptial showers.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

She herself paints the crimsoning year with flowery jewels ; herself coaxes swelling buds into warm clusters under the West Wind's breath ; herself sprinkles dripping wetness of the glittering dew that the night-air leaves as it passes.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

Sparkling tears quiver in a heavy drip, the little splashing dew-bead holds together in its fall : the moisture that the stars distil on cloudless nights unfolds the maiden buds from their wet sheaths at daybreak.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

Lo, the petalled crimsons have unveiled their blush, and a flame of roses breaks from the warm clusters : the Goddess herself has bidden the roses loosen the raiment from their maiden buds, to be naked virgin brides in the fresh daybreak.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

Compounded of Venus' blood and of Love's kiss and of jewels and of flames and of flushes of the sun, to-morrow the bride unashamed will unfold from the wet cluster the crimson that lurked hid in its taper sheath.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

Herself the Goddess has bidden the nymphs go forth in the myrtle thicket : with the girls a boy goes in company ; and yet it may not be deemed that Love is gone on festival if he carries his shafts. Go forth, nymphs ; Love has laid by his weapons, he keeps festival.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

He has been bidden go forth unarmed, has been bidden go forth naked, that he might do no injury with bow nor shaft nor torch. But yet take heed, nymphs, because Cupid is fair ; Love naked is complete, Love unarmed is the same.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

Venus sends thee maidens as virginal as thou : "One thing it is we ask : retire, maid of Delos, that the woodland be unstained by wild creatures' slaughter, and trace her verdurous shadows over the fresh flowers."

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

Herself she would ask thee, if she might bend thy virginity ; thyself she would thou earnest, if that were meet for a maiden : now for three nights wouldst thou see the bands pass along thy glades amid assembled multitudes making festival.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

Among flowery garlands, among myrtle bowers, Ceres and Bacchus are not absent, nor the god of the poets. All the night shall be kept awake with songs unceasingly ; Dione shall be queen in the woods : do thou retire, maid of Delos.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

The Goddess has bidden her judgment-seat be set amid flowers of Hybla; herself will preside and declare her laws, the Graces will sit beside her. Pour forth all thy flowerage, O Hybla, the whole foison of the year ; put on thy garment of flowers, O Hybla, over all the plain of Enna.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

Here will be the country-maidens or the hill-maidens, and they who haunt forests and groves and springs : the mother of the winged god has bidden them all sit beside her, has bidden maids put no affiance even in naked love.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

To quicken the whole year from the clouds of spring, the bridegroom-shower has flowed into the lap of his fair bride, that so mingling with the vast frame he might pass through sea and through sky and through all the lands to nourish their offspring.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

Herself the Creatress in hidden might sways flesh and spirit from within with her enkindling life. Herself she engrafted her Trojan offspring on the Latins, herself made the wedding of the Sabines with the sons of Romulus.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

Herself along the passage of the seed drew the flooding tide of herself through sky and through the lands and through the sea beneath, herself poured the quickening life through their veins, and bade the universe know the ways of birth.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

Herself she gave her son the Laurentine maid for bride, and gives thereafter to Mars the shy cloistered virgin, from these to beget Ramnes and Quirites, and for issue of posterity Romulus the sire and Caesar the grandchild of her line.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love,

The country quickens with love's delight, the country feels Venus' touch : Love himself, the child of Dione, is deemed country-born. Him, while the field broke to birth, herself she took up into her bosom, herself nursed with the dainty kisses of flowers.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

Lo, now the bulls lay a broad flank upon the broom ; each community is held together in wedlock-band. Lo, beneath the shade the bleating flock with their lords, and tuneful birds that the Goddess has bidden not be mute.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

Now hoarse-mouthed swans crash trumpeting over the pools; the maid of Tereus makes descant under the poplar shade, that you would think tunes of love issued trilling from her mouth, and not a sister's complaint of a barbarous lord.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.

She sings, we are mute : when is my spring coming? when shall I be as the swallow, that I may cease to be voiceless? I have lost the Muse in silence, nor does Apollo regard me : so Amyclae, being mute, perished by silence.

To-morrow shall be love for the loveless, and for the lover to-morrow shall be love.