Another to yesterday’s list of translations – Helen Waddell’s rendering of Foeda est in coitu et brevis voluptas from her Mediaeval Latin Lyrics:
Delight of lust is gross and brief
And weariness treads on desire.
Not beasts are we, to rush on it,
Love sickens there, and dies the fire.
But in eternal holiday,
Thus, thus, lie still and kiss the hours away.
No weariness is here, no shamefastness,
Here is, was, shall be, all delightsomeness.
And here no end shall be,
But a beginning everlastingly.
Extracts 