Catullus’ poem to Lesbia portrays his love for her by asking her to give him so many kisses that “we’ll lose track of the number” and also asks her to grow old and eventually die with him, which can be seen in the line “we must sleep one endless night”. In class, when reviewing this poem we brought up the concept of numbers and how the numbers used in this poem, thousand and hundred, are used to show the prominence of his love for her. This conversation of numbers also made me think of a popular song from the musical The Last Five Years. This poem reminded me of the song “The Next Ten Minutes” because like Catullus, the leading man, Jamie, is professing his love to his lover and is asking her to stay with him forever, in this case through marriage. The fact that he uses time scales like “ten lifetimes” and “a million summers” exaggerated his love for her by using the same number concept as Catullus.
However, one prominent difference between the two works is that in “The Next Ten Minutes” we know that Jamie’s lover, Cathy, reciprocates his love and also uses exaggerated terms like “forever” when describing her love for him. However, with Catullus, we know for a fact that Lesbia does not reciprocate his feelings, as shown by the fact that she is reluctant to give him these kisses. Also, in the end, Lesbia leaves Catullus for another man.
5
Bing and Cohen
Let’s live, my Lesbia, and let’s love
and not give a dime for all the talk
of overly severe old men.
Suns can set and rise again;
for us, once the brief day ends,
we must sleep one endless night.
Give me one thousand kisses, then a hundred,
then another thousand, then a second hundred,
then yet another thousand, then a hundred;
then, when we’ve had many thousands of kisses,
we’ll lose track of the number, so we won’t know,
and so no one can give us the evil eye
by knowing that our kisses were so many.