Virgil, Aeneid II.792-794
Melphi speaks
Ter conatus ibi collo dare bracchia circum:
ter frustra comprensa manus effugit imago,
par levibus ventis volucrique simillima somno.
The priest translates
«Three times I tried there to throw my arms around her neck; three times the image, clasped in vain, slipped from my hands, like the light winds and most like a fleeting dream.»
And interprets
This line touches the tenderest place: the wish to hold on to someone who is no longer here, or no longer reachable as before. It may be a bereavement, a love that ended, a friendship that drifted away. Melphi understands the gesture of arms closing on empty air and does not ask you to stop feeling. It points out, though, that in the poem that shade leaves words and directions for the future before it vanishes. This is not the time to chase what slips away; it is the time to gather what it has left you and carry it with you. The impossible embrace can become a promise to keep.
The historical translations
Me l’avventai, per ritenerla, al collo;
E tre volte abbracciandola, altrettante,
Come vento stringessi o fumo o sogno,
Me ne tornai con le man vote al petto.
Thrice would my frustrate arms her form enfold;
thrice from the clasp of hand that vision fled,
like wafted winds and like a fleeting dream.