Slow sleep, slipping languidly, covered their eyes.

Fervent fury abandons the mind in soft sleep.

But when the golden-faced Sun with eyes of rays

Surveyed the white sky, hard ground, wild sea,

And drove off night’s shadows with lively loud feet

Sleep woke Attis there and fled quickly.

The goddess Pasithea welcomed Sleep in her trembling bosom.

In the wake of quiet sleep and free from frenzied madness,

The moment Attis replayed in her mind what she had done

And clocked, clear-headed

Where she was

What she lacked

She made her way back to the shore again.

Her heart was rippling.

Watching, there, a desert of sea with tears in her eyes

She spoke to her country in a voice that was sad, miserable, like this:

‘Oh my country, my maker, my mother, my country oh

How rueful when I left you, as runaway slaves escape their masters

So my feet took me to Mount Ida’s groves,

To be mid-snow and ice-riven beast lairs

And to approach, quite witless, their dens in the shadows.

Where do I believe you lie, my country? Or on which plots?

My very pupils burn to turn their gaze to you

While for sharp season my mind is free of rabidity.

Am I to be uprooted from my home to these backwoods?

Am I to retire from my country, possessions, friends, parents?

Am I to retire from the forum, palaestra, racecourse, gym?

Helpless, helpless, heart, more, more, must you weep.

For what shape or form have I not been at one with?

A woman, now, pubescent, young man, boy

I blossomed at the gym; I was the fat in the olive oil;

My doorways were busy, my porch was warm,

My house was decked with plaits of flowers

When it was time to leave my bed at dawn.

Must I wait today on the gods and suffer in Cybele’s service?

A priestess, me, a part of myself, a seedless man, shall I be?

Am I to garden the frozen snow-cuddled soils of green Ida?

Live my life beneath the tall pillars of Phrygia

Where deer farm forest, where boar gad grove?

Now, now, I regret what I did. Now, now, and I grieve.’

When this sound rushed from her rosy lips

Relaying unprecedented news to the twin ears of the gods

Cybele at once released the yoke from her lions

And goading the enemy of the flock to her left, says this:

‘Onwards,’ she said, ‘Go Fierce One, see that fury drives him on,

Let him be struck by the blow of madness and return to the groves,

Since he so obviously desires to elude my authority,

Come whip your back with your tail, suffer your own lashes,

See everywhere resound with bellow and roar,

Toss the ruddy mane on your taut neck.’

So spoke fearsome Cybele and loosed the yoke with her hand.

Roused, the beast incites himself to speed,

Roams, roars, tramples the vegetation with ranging paw.