The Latin-Only Muse

“O Poeta,[1] salve,” began a voice behind my chair
I turned around and spotted there
A Roman lady, tall and fair.

She responded mistily, as through vellum,
“Audivi debere scribere te libellum,
Volo iuvare te, quare Musa sum.”

“Domina, videre te est magnum gaudium
Atque das honorem esse in domum.
Sed a quid viam venis hic ad parva domum?”

“Noli putare a quid viam, pro immortalem
Et nostrae viae non mortalis. Musa [2] sum;
Cur inquiris via mea? Scribe!”

“Oro iuvare me in linguam Anglicam,
Pro magister qui leget mea saturam
Non dicit Latinam, sapiens quamquam.”

“Non dicit Latinam? Sed ea lingua sola!
Heu, obii!” And here she wept. “Mea
Iter et labor atque sapientia, nihil omnia!”

“O candida musa, O—” but she moaned on.
“Romana musa sum! Crudelis poeta!
Amo te, sed si iuvo, in Latinam lingua

Erit, aut nihil. Nihil. Nihil! Discedo
Nam non amas me, scelesta puella!
Humus sub pedibus fugiatur!

Crustula tua contundiam in manu!
Caepas te fleat! Et—et—destillet
Atramenti de pennam! Discedo!”

The muse was gone, my serenity smitten.
The moral of this story written:
Humor muses, or they’ll be flitten.


[1] This is a first declension masculine noun which I am taking in this poem as a feminine because it refers to the author, and I the author am feminine.
2. I have not quite decided on the ontological status of muses, but I think they are in a similar class as Santa Claus. :-)