A Leak In The Safe

Johann Michael Rottmayr
Austrian, 1654-1730

 1690/95

Art Institute of Chicago

As brown dusk blackens into night

And Somnus slowly lulls the Earth,

Buried in the shadow of my Curtains,

A dream comes to set my spirit free

To be admitted into the intimacy

Of its revered, & majestic queen.

But her manner is so easy, so dear,

So inviting, it seems to me I might soon

Be allowed to hold her without fear,

If only as Endymion the Moon.

— Maurice Sceve/translated by Richard Sieburth

after Pietro Buonaccorsi, called Perino del Vaga
Italian, 1501-1547

late 16th century

Art Institute of Chicago

Though seen to be carefree beyond measure,

I am as wretched as I’ve been in years,

Your gentle words, yes, still give me pleasure

When they fall so cruelly upon my ears:

And I take great pains that a sense adhere

To our long conversings over time.

But when I race to the goal of my desire,

Your wishes, now elsewhere inclined,

Explain why, in my tormented course,

Daphne, you flee me, Apollo on fire.

— Maurice Sceve/Translated by Richard Sieburth

Edward Burne-Jones
English, 1833-1898

 1885

Art Institute of Chicago

If it be Cupid, why does he murder me,

Whose love was great, & never knew to hate?

This never ceases to astonish me,

Who never gave him cause to be irate:

Yet I allow him, without a complaint,

To consume me, just like Wax by fire.

And killing me, he desires that I live,

And loving others, cease to love myself.

What need is there to go on slaying me?

Who loves in vain has far enough of death.

— Maurice Sceve/Translated by Richard Sieburth