Wodwo Vergil: Eclogue 3

Menalcas
So, these sheep, eh Damoetas?

Meliboeus's, are they?

Damoetas
Mate, not his. Aegon's, isn't it.
And this is me, minding them.

Aegon trusts me, see. 

Menalcas
Oho, that's this lot fucked, then.

Off on a date, is he?

And while your boss's hands are on Neara's tits
like a kid with playdoh

you'll be all over these suede udders

groping out six times the usual flow of milk,

stealing sustenance from the lambkins' little mouths
glutting yourself, selling the surplus. Leaving

ewes as giddy-weak

as marathon-runners crossing the line,

legs all rope.

Naughty naughty.

Damoetas
Fuck off, my friend.
You think I don't know 

who you've been doing? And with what fervour?

Do me a favour.

Menalcas
Careful now. You seen me use a knife?.

Damoetas
Oh, so scared.
Veritably quaking.
Check out these trees, yeah? A longer look?
I like to think of these old-boy beeches as

witnesses. They stand, they surveil.
Perfect recall, isn't it?
They saw when you knacked that bow across your knee

stunned it to splinters, threw the pieces in the sedge.

The bow-and-arrow given to young Damon, 

and you browned-off for not getting it.

Moody Menalcas, you sulky fucker.

Menalcas
Oho. You didn't steal Damon's goat, then?

My fucking mistake. My miscuntderstanding.

That wasn't you, whilst the boy's dog, Lycisca,

kept hammering away at the plank of his barking

over and over,

as if barking was the only idea in his head.

Nah, saw you, mate. Called to Tityrus, didn't I,

and you ducked behind the fucking hedgerow.

Damoetas
He owed me that goat.

Won it fair and square,

squire.

Menalcas
Right: You sang a whole fucking cantata

and he wheezed old king cole,
so you won, right?

Thing is, you can no more carry a tune than 

clouds can hold onto the weight
of their own hard rain.
Your singing is piss through a colander.

Sound like a worn-down brake-pad.

I've shat turds with a better top end
no word of a fucking lie.

Damoetas
Care to put your money where your
hairy sack-shaped mouth is?

I'll bet you this heifer; a twice-a-day milker.

Menalcas 
Seriously, though, look:
if I bet one of these sheep, my Dad 

would fucking kill me, and my stepmother

would rip off my balls with nails

lacquered black like ten raven beaks.

So fuck that for a game of shepherds.

No, mate

no

I bet you: one girl, two cups. Cups, that's it.

Alcimedon spiked them onto his centrifuge

spun and scraped the wood away

like candyfloss in reverse,
until they were shapely as hourglasses, then

he worked vines into the sides with his burin

ivy berries like a cluster of
sweet little hemorrhoids
and standing under them two men
Conon, one, and
I forget the name of the other geezer.

Holding a wand, though, so maybe Gandalf.

Damoetas
Nah, babe, I already got two Alcimedon cups, don't I,
and mine have handles, you loser.
Mine got Orpheus on them, in a tangle
of forest matrix as it locks about him, in love with him.
Hardly worth a cow, though, is it? Some cups?

Menalcas
Whatever. Bet's on, fucker.
Your cum's thin as piss and mine's fucking gold-top.
All we need's a judge, impartial like.
And, bingo, here comes Palaemon. He'll do.
For a singing comp he'll doo-be-doo-be-doo.

Damoetas
Bring it.

Palaemon
Gents, let's park our derrieres
on this dollar-green grass, right here.
Pastures and trees and all that, burgeoning
all around us
my friends, truly burgeoning.
The trees standing high as a ship's mast:
foliage came gliding by as green as
aim-air-auld
as the poet says. Hi-de-hi.
Damoetas, you go first, sir.
Then you, Menalcas.

Damoetas
"You'd think that people woulda
had enough of silly Jove-songs
I asked the Muse now and she said
it isn't so
oh no."

Menalcas
"Phoebus loves me
yeah, yeah yeah
Phoe loves me
yeah yeah yeah
and with hyacinths
she gives me what I need."

Damoetas
"Gay Galatea
Gay Galatea
Gay Galatea
Chucks me an apple,
Then runs to the willows
Ooh I gotta see her
I gotta see her
Galatea."

Menalcas
"I don't got to beg her
Amyntas comes down;
my dogs don't bark
my dogs don't bark
when she comes round."

Damoetas
"I got my eyes on a
gift for my love
I got my eyes on a
gift for my love
in the skies is my
gift for my love
where pigeons fly
is my gift for my love
gift for my love."

Menalcas
"Ten gold apples
I gave to that boy.
Ten gold apples
I gave to that boy.
And if he'll just kiss me
I'll give him ten ones more
and he'll have
Twenty gold apples
lying on his floor."

Damoetas
"Every little breeze seems to whisper
Galatea
whispea
Galatea
Birds in the trees seem to twitter
Galatea
twittea
Galatea."

Menalcas
"It breaks my heart to see you go
Iollas
You say farewell I'm filled with woe
Iollas
Oh Iollas"

Damoetas
"She don't have to be beautiful
To be his girl
She just use her country-breeding,
To rock his world.
She don't have to be rich
For Pollio
She don't got to own cows
To make him go
Oh Pie-ri-an maids
he is com-pat-i-ble with—"

Menalcas
Alright alright. Fucking hell, already.
Let me just clear my throat.

"Pollio
Pollio
baby
You know I'm in need of you?
Pollio
Pollio
baby
Don't you believe it's true?"

Damoetas
You're just embarrassing yourself.
Stand back, I'm going to blast this next one,
go full Adele in the dale:

"And with Pollio
When things crumble
We will stand tall-
all-he-all
face it altogether;
stay with Pollio
when things crumble
we will stand tall-all-all
Face it all
together
with Pollio."

Menalcas
You'll do yourself a mischief
hernia or therenia. Settle down, my boy.

"I get no kick from sham Bavius,
His rubbish verse doesn't thrill me at all
But baby, Maevius's true:
That I get a goat
Out of you."

Damoetas
"My Apollo
Oh mist rolling in from the sea
You must know
the whole breadth of heaven
sees you
Apollo."

Menalcas
"You make me dizzy
Miss Phyllis,
kings are on the line;
you make me dizzy
Miss Phyllis
they all think you're so fine;
come on Miss Phyllis
come and love me all the time."

Palaemon
Enough!
Fuck me.
Bacchus on a badger that was bad.
Each as atrocious as at-nother.
You've worked yourselves into
a right two-and-eight.
Boy, boys, shut off
your fucking sluices,
for the fields have drunk their fill.