Collected Works

May it be believed that she was returned by a youth and a lover, a virgin! You ask how I know this so well? I love. You may call it force and veil the fault with a name; she who is snatched so often provided herself to be snatched. But Oenone remains chaste for her deceiving husband, and you could have been deceived by your own laws.

Swift satyrs (I was hiding, sheltered in the woods) sought me out, a wanton crowd with rapid feet. And Faunus, his horned head crowned with a sharp pine, sought me on the immense ridges where Ida swells. The builder of Troy Apollo, conspicuous for his faith, loved me; he holds the spoils of my virginity. That, too, was by struggle; yet I tore his hair with my nails, and his face was made rough by my fingers. I did not demand gems and gold as the price of the defilement; gifts shamefully buy a noble body. Thinking me worthy, he himself handed down the healing arts to me, and he admitted my hands to his gifts. Whatever herb is potent for aid, and whatever root is useful for healing, is born in the whole world—it is mine.

Wretched me, that love is not curable by herbs! I, prudent, am found lacking by my own art. The finder of the remedy himself is said to have grazed the Pheraean cows and was struck by our fire. Just as the earth, fecund with created grasses, cannot bring you aid, neither can the god. And you can, and I have earned it; pity a worthy girl. I do not bear bloody weapons with the Danaans, but I am yours; I was with you in your childish years, and I pray that you remain mine for what time is left.

Hypsipyle to Jason.

You are said to have touched the shores of Thessaly in your returning ship, rich with the fleece of the golden sheep. I congratulate you on your safety, as much as you allow; yet I should have been made more certain of this by your own writing. For even if you were not to return to my own kingdoms, you could not have been without winds when you desired to. Any letter may be signed as coming with an adverse wind; I, Hypsipyle, was worthy of receiving a greeting. Why did rumor reach me sooner than a messenger letter? That you had gone under the yoke with the sacred oxen of Mars, that the crops of men had grown from the sown seeds, and that you did not need your own right hand for the slaughter—