More Latin

We linguists don't get much respect. After all, how many times can you grin while some witty buffoon tells you you must be a cunning linguist? But every once in a while, I'm able to generate some respect and interest with a language-oriented post. Since my post this past Monday on Useful Latin got such a great response, I figured I might as well stick with linguistic success and share some more Latin with you, in the form of this great poem I discovered today in my daily "Writers' Almanac" e-mail from Garrison Keillor (for those of you who have never studied Latin, the title means, "I Love, You Love")...

Amo, Amas
by John O'Keefe

Amo, Amas, I love a lass
As a cedar tall and slender;
Sweet cowslip's grace is her nominative case,
And she's of the feminine gender.

Rorum, Corum, sunt divorum,
Harum, Scarum divo;
Tag-rag, merry-derry, periwig and hat-band
Hic hoc horum genitivo.

Can I decline a Nymph divine?
Her voice as a flute is dulcis.
Her oculus bright, her manus white,
And soft, when I tacto, her pulse is.

Rorum, Corum, sunt divorum,
Harum, Scarum divo;
Tag-rag, merry-derry, periwig and hat-band
Hic hoc horum genitivo.

Oh, how bella my puella,
I'll kiss secula seculorum.
If I've luck, sir, she's my uxor,
O dies benedictorum.

Rorum, Corum, sunt divorum,
Harum, Scarum divo;
Tag-rag, merry-derry, periwig and hat-band
Hic hoc horum genitivo.

And since tempus is fugiting, it's time to go.

Have a good day. It's Friday, after all.

More thoughts tomorrow...be here for Cartoon Saturday

Bilbo

P.S. - by the way, I actually am a cunning ... uh ... never mind.

B.