And as said before, That seed is roused in us when once ripe age Has made our body strong... As divers causes give to divers things Impulse and irritation, so one force In human kind rouses the human seed To spurt from man. As soon as ever it issues, Forced from its first abodes, it passes down In the whole body through the limbs and frame, Meeting in certain regions of our thews, And stirs amain the genitals of man. The goaded regions swell with seed, and then Comes the delight to dart the same at what The mad desire so yearns, and body seeks That object, whence the mind by love is pierced. For well-nigh each man falleth toward his wound, And our blood spurts even toward the spot from whence The stroke wherewith we are strook, and if indeed The foe be close, the red jet reaches him. Thus, one who gets a stroke from Venus' shafts-- Whether a boy with limbs effeminate Assault him, or a woman darting love From all her body--that one strains to get Even to the thing whereby he's hit, and longs To join with it and cast into its frame The fluid drawn even from within its own. For the mute craving doth presage delight. THE PASSION OF LOVE This craving 'tis that's Venus unto us: From this, engender all the lures of love, From this, O first hath into human hearts Trickled that drop of joyance which ere long Is by chill care succeeded. Since, indeed, Though she thou lovest now be far away, Yet idol-images of her are near And the sweet name is floating in thy ear. But it behooves to flee those images; And scare afar whatever feeds thy love; And turn elsewhere thy mind; and vent the sperm, Within thee gathered, into sundry bodies, Nor, with thy thoughts still busied with one love, Keep it for one delight, and so store up Care for thyself and pain inevitable. For, lo, the ulcer just by nourishing Grows to more life with deep inveteracy, And day by day the fury swells aflame, And the woe waxes heavier day by day-- Unless thou dost destroy even by new blows The former wounds of love, and curest them While yet they're fresh, by wandering freely round After the freely-wandering Venus, or Canst lead elsewhere the tumults of thy mind.