Читать книгу Little Cat - Tamara Faith Berger - Страница 7

TWO

Jupiter laughed aloud: ‘We have the answer.

There is a fellow called Tiresias.

Strolling to watch the birds and hear the bees

We came across two serpents capitulating.

He took the opportunity to kill

Both with a single blow, but merely hurt them –

And found himself transformed into a woman.

‘After the seventh year of womanhood,

Strolling to ponder on what women ponder

She saw in that same place the same two serpents

Knotted as before in copulation.

‘If your pain can still change your attacker

Just as you once changed me, then change me back.’

She hit the couple with a handy stick,

‘And there he stood as male as any man.‚Äô

‘He’ll explain,’ cried Juno, ‘why you are

Slave to your irresistible addiction

While the poor nymphs you force to share it with you

Do all they can to shun it.’

– Ovid, The Metamorphoses