Marriage Bed II

Woman, your words have cut me to the core.

Who has moved my bed? That would be a hard task,

even for the most skilled craftsman, unless a god

himself came down and with ease chose to shift it.

No mortal man alive, not in his prime,

could lightly prize it from its place. A great secret

lies in that bed's craftsmanship. It was my work,

my own, and no one else's.

Inside our court there grew a long-leaved olive tree,

flourishing and full, its trunk as thick as a pillar.

Around this I built my chamber, stone by stone,

and roofed it well, and hung close-fitting doors.

Then I lopped the foliage of that long-leaved olive,

and trimmed the trunk from the root up, and with my adze

planed it smooth and true, and to the line made it straight,

fashioning a bedpost. I bored it all with an auger.

Beginning with this post, I built my bed,

until it was finished, inlaid with gold and silver

and ivory. And I stretched on it a thong of ox-hide,

shining with purple dye.

There is our secret. And I do not know,

woman, if my bed is still fast, or if some man

has cut the olive trunk and moved it elsewhere.