Book 13
my father is chief ruler in your sea,
750
and therefor I now offer him to you
as your own father-in-law—But oh, do take
some pity on a suppliant,— and hear his prayer,
for only unto you my heart is given.
‘I, who despise the power of Jove, his heavens
and piercing lightnings, am afraid of you—
your wrath more fearful than the lightning's flash—
but I should be more patient under slights,
if you avoided all men: why reject
the Cyclops for the love that Acis gives?
And why prefer his smiles to my embraces,
but let him please himself, and let him please
you, Galatea, though against my will.
‘If I am given an opportunity
he will be shown that I have every strength
proportioned to a body vast as mine:
I will pull out his palpitating entrails,
and scatter his torn limbs about the fields
and over and throughout your salty waves;
and then let him unite himself to you.—
I burn so, and my slighted passion raves
with greater fury and I seem to hold
and carry Aetna in my breast—transferred
there with its flames—Oh Galatea! can
you listen to my passion thus unmoved!’
“I saw all this; and, after he in vain
had uttered such complaints, he stood up like
a raging bull whose heifer has been lost,
that cannot stand still, but must wander on
through brush and forests, that he knows so well:
when that fierce monster saw me and my Acis—
we neither knew nor guessed our fate—he roared:
‘I see you and you never will again
parade your love before me!’ In such a voice
as matched his giant size. All Aetna shook
and trembled at the noise; and I amazed
with horror, plunged into the adjoining sea.
“My loved one, Acis turned his back and fled
and cried out, ‘Help me Galatea, help!
