You can never hold back Spring

In early 56 BC Catullus was in Northern Turkey, in what was then Bithynia. He had been on the Governor's staff for a year. He had had a bad time of it, and could not wait to get home.

The only good thing to come out of his tour of duty was that he made a visit to his brother's grave, somewhere near Troy. He knew he would not be coming back, and wrote a poem as if from his brother's graveside.  

But his nostalgia was focused on Rome.

He wrote this poem in Spring 56 BC. He can scent spring on the air and the poem is all breathless excitement. He did not have wanderlust so much as a burning need to be home. I like to think he was gazing out from some window when he wrote this fantastic poem. Maybe he could even see the road that would take him home.

The translation is mine, so there's nobody to blame but me if you don't like it.


iam ver egelidos refert tepores,
iam caeli furor aequinoctialis
iucundis Zephyri silescit aureis.
linquantur Phrygii, Catulle, campi
Nicaeaeque ager uber aestuosae:
ad claras Asiae volemus urbes.
iam mens praetrepidans avet vagari,
iam laeti studio pedes vigescunt.
O dulces comitum valete coetus,
longe quos simul a domo profectos
diversae varie viae reportant.

Now spring is bringing back warm air

Now a west wind and pleasant breezes

Soothe the angry equinoctial skies.

Time to go, Catullus. Leave Phrygia’s plains

Leave burning Nicaea’s rich fields.

Let’s head for Asia’s famous cities.

Now my heart thinks of the trip and longs to get going

Now my feet itch happily at the thought.

Goodbye, good friends, good company.

Together we set out from home long ago

But travel back each on our own road.