Clusium
From Ancient Ways
"The Girl I Kissed at Clusium"
Oh, when I joined the Eagles
(As it might be yesterday)
I kissed a girl at Clusium
Before I marched away.
A long march, a long march, and twenty years in store,
When I left my girl at Clusium, beside the threshing-floor.
The girls of Spain were honey-sweet,
And the golden girls of Gaul:
And the Thracian maids were soft as birds
To hold the heart in thrall.
But the girl I kissed at Clusium,
Kissed and left at Clusium,
The girl I kissed at Clusium I remember best of all.
A long march, a long march, and twenty years behind
But the girl I kissed at Clusium comes easy to my mind.
-- From The Eagle of the Ninth. Story and words by Rosemary Sutcliff. Oxford UP, 1954