Metamorphoses

“And deservedly am I thus treated ; for why, in my rashness, did I make the discovery of this wound? why have I so speedily committed words to a hasty letter, which ought rather to have been concealed? The feelings of his mind ought first to have been tried beforehand by me, with ambiguous expressions. Lest he should not follow me in my course, I ought, with some part of my sail only , to have observed what kind of a breeze it was, and to have scudded over the sea in safety; whereas , now, I have filled my canvass with winds before untried. I am driven upon rocks in consequence; and sunk, I am buried beneath the whole ocean, and my sails have now no retreat. And besides, was I not forbidden, by unerring omens, to indulge my passion, at the time when the waxen tablets fell, as I ordered him to deliver them, and made my hopes sink to the ground? and ought not either the day to have been changed, or else my whole intentions; but rather, of the two , the day? Some God himself warned me, and gave me unerring signs, if I had not been deranged; and yet I ought to have spoken out myself, and not to have committed myself to writing, and personally I ought to have discovered my passion; then he would have seen my tears, then he would have seen the features of her who loved him; I might have given utterance to more than what the letter contained. I might have thrown my arms around his reluctant neck, and have embraced his feet, and lying on the ground , I might have begged for life; and if I had been repelled, I might have seemed on the point of death. All this, I say , I might then have done; if each of these things could not singly have softened his obdurate feelings, yet all of them might.

MetamorphosesOvidHenry T. RileyEnglishVerse permalinkRead in Book 9

Book 9, Line 34ProseID metamorphoses-riley-en-prose-9-34