XII COMPARISONS
Mitchell S. (Mitchell Starrett) Buck translation
Bergeronnet, bird of Kypris, sing with our first desires! The fresh bodies of young girls bloom with flowers like the earth. The night of all our dreams approaches and we talk of it among ourselves.
Sometimes we compare, all together, the differences in our beauties, our hair already long, our young breasts still small, our puberties round like shells and hidden under the nascent down.
Yesterday I competed with Melantho, my elder sister. She was proud of her breasts which had grown in a month, and pointing to my straight tunic, she called me “Little Child.”
No man could see us, we placed ourselves naked before the girls, and if she vanquished me on one point, I far surpassed her on all others. Bergeronnet, bird of Kypris, sing with our first desires!