By
Josef Maria Mayer
TEARS FOR
EVE’S CAT
Cat, my
sweet lady’s delight,
Whom she
plays with, holds on her lap,
Whom she
caresses the tail,
Whenever my
shining desire wishes
To play
with something she loves,
I suppose,
while strong passion abates,
It might be
a small relief from her pain:
Might I
caress you as she does
And ease
the cares of my sad mind!
THE DEATH
OF EVE’S CAT
Mourn, O
you lovers and angels,
And such of
you as do love beauty:
My lady’s
cat is dead,
The cat, my
lady’s delight,
Whom she
loved more than her eyes.
For she was
sweet as honey, and knew her
As well as
my lady her own mother,
She never
moved from her lap,
But,
sleeping softly on her lap,
Loved her
mistress alone.
Now she
goes down the shadowy road
From which
no animal returns.
Now course
to you, evil shadow of death,
That
devours everything of beauty:
You’ve
stolen the lovely cat from me.
O evil
death! O poor little cat!
Now, by
your deed, my lady’s eyes
Are swollen
and red with weeping.
LETS LIVE
AND LOVE! TO EVE
Let us
live, my Eve, let us love,
And all the
words of the old and their moral,
May they be
worth less than nothing to us!
Suns may
set, and suns may rise again:
But when
our brief light has set,
Night is
one long everlasting dream.
Give me a
thousand kisses, a hundred more,
Another
thousand, and another hundred,
And, when
we’ve counted up the many thousands,
Confuse
them so as not to know them all,
So that no
hag may cast an evil eye,
By knowing
that there were so many kisses.
HOW MANY
KISSES? TO EVE
Eve, you
ask how many kisses of yours
Would be
enough and more to satisfy me.
As many as
the grains of the sand of the desert
That lie
under Yahweh’s Word
And at
Jerusalem’s sacred tomb of the Lord:
Or as many
as the stars, when night is still,
Gazing down
on secret human desires:
As many of
your kisses kissed
Are enough,
and more, for the mad Josef,
As can’t be
counted by hags,
Nor can
their evil tongues bewitch us.
AGAINST EVE
– TO MARK AND PAUL
Mark and
Paul, you faithful friends of Josef,
Whether he
penetrates farthest China,
Where the
Yellow Stream strikes the shore
With deep
resonance of thundering dragons,
Or among
the Russians or the happy Arabs,
Or where
the seven-mouthed Nile
Colours the
waters with his yellow earth,
Or whether
he’ll climb the high Alps,
Viewing the
great Pope’s monuments,
Or the
Seine or the gallic Rhone,
And the
furthest Britons on their isle,
Whatever
the will of the Father in Heaven
Brings,
ready now for anything,
Tell my
beautiful lady this in a few
Ill-omened
words of a bad oracle.
Let her
live and be happy with her husband,
Hold all
her friends in her embrace,
Truly
love-less, wearing them all down
Again and
again: let her not look for
My platonic
brotherly love as before,
She whose
crime destroyed it, like the last
Flower of
the field, touched once
By the
passing plough of the peasant.
TO
CATHERINE
Please, my
sweet Catherine,
My delight,
my charming girl:
Tell me to
come to you at noon.
And if you
tell me, help me along,
Let no-one
cover the sign at your house,
Nor you
shall choose to step out of doors,
But stay at
home, and get ready
For seven
fucks - in succession - with me!
Truly, if
you should want it, let me know it now:
Because
lying here, fed, and indolently full,
I’m making
a hole in my trousers.
NO COMPARISON
– TO VIOLA
Greetings,
woman with a nose not the shortest,
Feet not so
lovely, eyes not of the darkest,
Fingers not
slender, mouth never healed,
And a not
excessively charming tongue
(Bankrupt
Michael’s “little friend”).
And the
south pronounces you beautiful?
To be
compared to my sexy Eve?
O witless
and ignorant age of folly!
TO EVE
He seems
equal to the angels to me, that man,
If it’s
possible more than just a saint,
Who sitting
over against you, endlessly
Sees you
and hears you
Laughing so
sweetly, that with fierce pain I’m robbed
Of all of
my senses: because that moment
I see you,
Eve, nothing’s left of me...
……
But my
tongue is numbed, and through my poor limbs
Fires are
raging, the echo of your voice
Rings in
both my ears, my eyes are covered
With the
dark of night.
“Your
idleness is loathsome, Josef:
You delight
in idleness, and too much posturing:
Idleness
ruined the kingdoms and the cities
Of former
times.”
LAMENT FOR
EVE – TO MARK
O Mark, our
lady Eve, that Eve,
That Eve,
Josef alone loved
More than
himself, and all of his own,
Now at
crossroads, and down alleyways,
Jerks off
the brave sons of Germany.
My lady
says she’d rather marry no one but me,
Not if
Jesus himself were to ask her.
She says:
but what a woman says to her eager lover,
Should be
written on the wind and in running water.
Once you
said you preferred Josef alone,
Eve: would
not have Jesus before me.
I prized
you then not like an ordinary lover,
But as a
father prizes his children, his family.
Now I know
you: so, though I burn more fiercely,
Yet you’re
worth much less to me, and slighter.
How is
that, you ask? The pain of such love
Makes a
lover to love more, but to like less.
TO EVE
My mind’s
reduced to this, by your sins, Eve,
And has
ruined itself so in your service,
That now it
couldn’t wish you well,
Were you to
become what’s best,
Or stop
loving you if you do what’s worst.
YOUR
HUSBAND GEORGE – TO EVE
Eve says
bad things about me to her husband George’s face:
It’s the
greatest delight to that senseless fool.
Mule, don’t
you see? If she forgot and was silent about me,
That would
be right: now since she moans and abuses,
She not
only remembers, but something more serious,
She’s
angry. That is, she’s inflamed, so she speaks.
LOVE-HATE
I hate and
love Eve… And why, perhaps you’ll ask.
I don’t
know: but I feel, and I’m tormented.
TRUE BEAUTY
– TO EVE
Julie is
lovely to many. To me she’s white, long,
And
straight: I acknowledge that’s so.
But I don’t
agree that’s beauty: there’s no charm,
There’s not
a speck of good taste in all of that long body.
Eve’s
lovely, possessed of all that’s most beautiful,
Besides she
alone has stolen all charm from all other women.
INCOMPARABLE
- TO EVE
No woman
can say she’s been loved so much,
As my Eve
in truth’s been loved by me.
No faith in
any tie was ever so great,
As has been
found, on my part, in love of you.
SIGN OF
LOVE – TO EVE
Eve always
speaks ill of me, never shuts up
About me:
damn me if she doesn’t love me.
What’s the
sign? Because it’s the same with me: I’m
Continually
complaining, but damn me if I don’t love her.
BACK AGAIN
– TO EVE
If anything
happens to one who desires it, and wishes
And never
expects it, it’s a special delight to the mind.
Likewise,
this is delight, dearer than gold, to me,
That you
come back to me, Eve, in my longing.
Come back,
desired and un-hoped for, give yourself
Back to me.
O day marked out with greater brightness!
Who exists
more happily than me, or can say
That he
wishes for any life something greater than this?
A PRAYER –
TO EVE
You declare
that this love of ours will be happy,
Vita nova,
and eternal between us.
Great God,
let it be that she promises truthfully,
And says it
sincerely, and from her heart,
So we may
extend, through the whole of our life,
This endless
bond of sacred friendship.
SONG TO THE
VIRGIN MARY
Under
Mary’s protection,
We pure
maidens and boys,
We pure
boys and maidens
Sing a song
to Mary.
O, daughter
of Saint Anne,
Firstborn
daughter of Yahweh,
Your mother
have given birth to you
In the
gardens of Nazareth.
Mistress of
Mount Zion
And the
olive-garden Gethsemane,
The lily of
the valley
And the
rose of Jericho
On the
banks of the Jordan,
You are
called Genetrix
And Mother
of the unborn,
You are
called daughter, bride and mother,
You are the
moon and Christ the sun.
Your holy
feast-days
Measure for
us the year.
You bless
the wheat of the farmer
And the
clusters in the vineyard.
Take
whatever sacred title
Pleases
you, be a sweet help
To the
Church of Rome,
As you have
been of old.
