XDA

Caeli, Lesbia nostra, Lesbia illa.
illa Lesbia, quam Catullus unam
plus quam se atque suos amavit omnes,
nunc in quadriviis et angiportis
glubit magnanimi Remi nepotes.

Catullus XXXII

Caelius, our Lesbia, that Lesbia,
that Lesbia whom Catullus loved
more than himself and everything his,
now loiters at the cross-roads and in the alleys
to peel the grandsons of the brave Remus.

Catullus 32

Huc est mens deducta tua mea, Lesbia, culpa
atque ita se officio perdidit ipsa suo,
ut iam nec bene velle queat tibi, si optima fias,
nec desistere amare, omnia si facias.

Catullus LXXII

To this point has my mind been dragged down, Lesbia, by your fault
And so by its own devotion my mind has destroyed itself,
As now it is not possible to wish you well, even if you become the best,
Nor is one able to stop loving, even if you did everything.

Catullus 72

These poems are clearly from the period during which he loves and hates Lesbia at the same time. He says so as often as he can in these short poems. In the first, he has to repeat his identification of her three times, in a sort of breaking though a former denial. He declares that he loved Lesbia more than himself and all that is his, but then calls her a street whore--wonderful use of the word (glubeo) which usually denotes taking the rind off fruit but here means both strip and rob. She robs them by inferior love making for money (and perhaps literally). That's some sort of bitterness on Catullus' part--World class bitterness, I think.

In the second, he claims that she has ruined his mind because of the strength of his love so that now he can hold contradictory thoughts (like love and hate) about her, but worse--he's stuck; now he can't think well of her if she is very good or stop loving her if she is bad (the clever optima/omnia dichotomy).

As a school boy, I thought nothing of these poems--just worked through the translations. Now as a person somewhat wounded in love, I can see the truth and pathos in his predicament--his rational mind is repelled by the very things his overwhelming emotion is drawn too. Welcome to the party, pal, Catullus now says to me in exo-text from nearly two millennia's distance in time.