427 If you could love me (Poems of Exile)

This poem is from my collection The Poems of Exile, inspired by Seneca, or pseudo-Seneca.  An explanation of their genesis is posted in The Madness of Exile.  Poem 427 is one of the most corrupt in the original collection, which has given me plenty of leeway to interpolate. 

After the grim and unappealing 'Horrid Corsica' I want to show a different side to the imaginary poet.

If you could love me…

my sweet love, if you could love me like this:

alone to bed (Hesperus would see this)

alone (Lucifer would see this) to arise

no passage of time would cease our borrowed love

and in return you would always be loved

if only you would deny that you surrender, so often, to others

if only you would surrender, more often, to me

and your betraying snare, squeezing my soul, my heart, my pride

I want to give you my nights complete:

            you are unavailable

            you condemn the wasted night

and my empty bed is hostage to your cruel fear

once, you promised me, for life:  no more

            one senseless quarrel leaves me alone:

            when I was down with the ‘political illness’

            you flirted with your entire body

and then you denied our love

surely, you gave a thousand kisses to senators

            they say you were generous

you ensnared me so slowly:

            briefly, you were my dear woman

            eternally dear, in truth

your love affairs defeat me so quickly:

            jealousy stretches the night to endless torture

            I am always awake