“Acis, the lovely youth, whose loss I mourn, From Faunus, and the nymph Symethis, born, Was both his parents’ pleasure, but to me, Was all that love could make a lover be. The gods our minds in mutual bands did join, I was his only joy, and he was mine. Now sixteen summers the sweet youth had seen, And doubtful down began to shade his chin, When Polyphemus first disturbed our joy, And loved me fiercely, as I loved the boy. Ask not which passion in my soul was higher My last aversion, or my first desire, Nor this the greater was, nor that the less, Both were alike, for both were in excess. Thee, Venus, thee, both heaven and earth obey, Immense thy power, and boundless is thy sway. The cyclop, who defied the ethereal throne, And thought no thunder louder than his own, The terror of the woods, and wilder far Than wolves in plains, or bears in forests, are, The inhuman host, who made his bloody feasts On mangled members of his butcher’d guests, Yet felt the force of love, and fierce desire, And burn’d for me with unrelenting fire