De Tribus Puellis - Excerpts

Excerpts

The opening lines of the poem are imitations of Horace (Satires, I.9: Ibam forte via sacra, "I chanced to be going along the Sacred Way") and Ovid (Amores, I.1, who also did not know at the outset to whom he would address his poem):

I chanced to go down a road alone one day,
and Love, just as usual, was my only companion.
And as I walked, I was composing some verses,
musing on a girl to whom to send the poems.

The poet is quite pleased by the ideal size of his girl's breasts:

I could not discern the shape of her breasts,
either because they were too small or because
they were bound up—girls frequently bind their breasts
with bands, for too buxom a bosom men
do not find enticing—but this girl, my girl,
does not have to resort to such measures,
for her bosom by nature is quite nicely small.

Her lovely breasts were small, perfect for love
(if a little bit firm, nonetheless just right for me).

The author does not follow Ovid, who believed that women desire physical compulsion, rather he portrays the willing girl submitting to her lover out of desire:

"Love, she said, do your will with me, do it swiftly,
for black night is fleeing, day returning."
Then she asked for my hand, and I stretched it out.
She placed it on her breasts and she said:
"What, my dearest love, do you feel now?"