Here is my mind dragged down, Lesbia, by your infidelity.
It so destroyed itself by its own devotion
that now I am neither able to wish you well, if you become great,
nor to stop loving you, if you commit every sin.
Huc est mens deducta tua mea, Lesbia, culpa
atque ita se officio perdidit ipsa suo,
ut iam nec bene velle quaet tibi, si optima fias,
nec desistere amare, omnia si facias.
This poem by Catullus carries on the theme of Catullus 72, that because of Lesbia's unfaithfulness, Catullus hates her, but he cannot stop loving her, try as he might. It's really quite a sad situation, when you think about it, and one that Catullus eloquently and succinctly explains in a later poem, Catullus 85 (aka Odi et Amo). The meter is elegiac couplet, like so many of his poems about Lesbia. One note on the translation/Latin text: some versions of the text take mea (in line 1) with Lesbia, which makes some sense as Catullus does that in his earlier poems often. But arranging the first line that way leaves mens without an epithet, so it makes more sense, imho, to leave things as I have them here.
Latin text from:
Aronson, Andrew C. and Robert Broughner. Catullus and Horace. White Plains, NY: Longman, 1988
Some commentary from:
Fordyce, C. J. Catullus. New York: Oxford University Press, 1961.
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