The Etruscan Shepherd - Momus

I’ve got a death bone in my flute

The machinery of the salute

Said the Etruscan shepherd

I speak the language of the birds

But I won’t repeat the things I’ve heard

And the lamb lies down with the leopard

Let the phallus mark my route

With a lingam stone and a twin-head flute

Said the Etruscan shepherd

We’re more alive here in our tombs

Than you people in your rooms

And the lamb lies down with the leopard

We make love at the chariot race

Theopompus of Chios says

And I’m the Etruscan shepherd

Little birds are little girls

That fly like augurs through the world

And the lamb lies down with the leopard

The women go with anyone at the tomb of Triclinium

Said the Etruscan shepherd

The black-faced lion lies with the deer

The cat with the dove and the fawn with the steer

And the lamb doth lie with the leopard

Lightning’s not the collision of clouds

The clouds collide when the lightning allows

Said the Etruscan shepherd

Let us row to Elba’s shore

Where the copperhead people mine their ore

And the lamb lies down with the leopard

If you need me I’ll be whitening bones

Up beside the lingam stones

Said the Etruscan shepherd

Up on the hillside with my flute

Coaxing budding from the shoots

And the lamb lies down with the leopard

Naked through the universe

Dive in the sea to quench your thirst

Said the Etruscan shepherd

Death is a friend to the living ones

The hidden lining in darkness shines

And the lamb lies down with the leopard