Catullus Quotes

Mulier cupido quod dicit amanti in vento et rapida scribere oportet aqua.

Quaeris, quot mihi basiationes
tuae, Lesbia, sint satis superque?

Odi et amo. quare id faciam, fortasse requiris. nescio, sed fieri sentio et excrucior.

Desine de quoquam quicquam bene velle mereri,
Aut aliquem fieri posse putare pium.

What a woman says to her ardent lover should be written in wind and running water.

You ask how many kissings of you, Lesbia, are enough for me and more than enough?

Omnia fanda nefanda malo permixta furore
iustificam nobis mentem avertere deorum.

Ipse qui sit, utrum sit an non sit, id quoque nescit.

Cui dono lepidum novum libellum
Arido modo pumice expolitum?

Lugete, O Veneres Cupidinesque,
Et quantum est hominum venustiorum.
Passer mortuus est meae puellae,
Passer, deliciae meae puellae.

Ah, what is more blessed than to put cares away, when the mind lays by its burden, and tired with labour of far travel we have come to our own home and rest on the couch we longed for? This it is which alone is worth all these toils.

It is difficult suddenly to lay aside a long-standing love.

Difficile est longum subito deponere amorem.

Otium et reges prius et beatas
perdidit urbes.

Let us live, my Lesbia, and love, and value at one farthing all the talk of crabbed old men. Suns may set and rise again. For us, when the short light has once set, remains to be slept the sleep of one unbroken night.