Original
Modern English
Can I go forward when my heart is here?
Can I leave even when my heart is here?
Turn back, dull earth, and find thy centre out.
I will be an empty vessel until I go back and find my heart back.
Romeo! My cousin Romeo! Romeo!
Romeo! My cousin Romeo! Romeo!
He is wise, And on my life hath stol’n him home to bed.
He is a wise boy and I can bet it on my life that he ran to go back home and go to bed.
He ran this way, and leap’d this orchard wall:
He ran this way, and jumped over this orchard wall.
Call, good Mercutio.
Call him, good Mercutio.
Nay, I’ll conjure too.
No, I might even summon him just as we summon a spirit.
Romeo! Humours! Madman! Passion! Lover!
Romeo! Humour! Madman! Passion! Lover!
Appear thou in the likeness of a sigh, Speak but one rhyme, and I am satisfied;
Appear before me in the form of a sigh, Speak one word, and I will be satisfied.
Cry but‘Ah me!’Pronounce but Love and dove; Speak to my gossip Venus one fair word,
Cry out ‘Ah me!’ Say love and dove. Say one pretty word to my gossiping friend, Venus.
One nickname for her purblind son and heir, Young Abraham Cupid, he that shot so trim When King Cophetua lov’d the beggar-maid.
Say the nickname of her blind son and heir, Young Abraham Cupid, who shot arrows in a way to make King Cophetua fall in love with the beggar-maid.
He heareth not, he stirreth not, he moveth not;
Romeo does not hear me, he does not move, he does not stir.
The ape is dead, and I must conjure him. I conjure thee by Rosaline’s bright eyes,
The ape is dead, so I must conjure him to appear.
By her high forehead and her scarlet lip, By her fine foot, straight leg, and quivering thigh, And the demesnes that there adjacent lie, That in thy likeness thou appear to us.
By Rosaline’s bright eyes, by her high forehead and her scarlet lip, by her fine foot, straight leg, and quivering thigh, and by her parts that lie adjacent to thighs, I summon you to appear before us.
An if he hear thee, thou wilt anger him.
He will be angry if he hears you.
This cannot anger him.
This won’t make him angry.
’Twould anger him To raise a spirit in his mistress’circle, Of some strange nature, letting it there stand Till she had laid it, and conjur’d it down; That were some spite.
It would anger him if I conjured a spirit in front of Rosaline to lie with down her and have sex with her. That would really make him angry.
My invocation Is fair and honest, and, in his mistress’name, I conjure only but to raise up him.
My invocation is fair and truthful. I am using his lover’s name just as an attempt to call him out of his darkness.
Come, he hath hid himself among these trees To be consorted with the humorous night.
Come, he has hidden himself within these trees so he could be alone in the night.
Blind is his love, and best befits the dark.
His love has made him blind so it is right that he shares it with the darkness.
If love be blind, love cannot hit the mark.
If love is blind, it can’t hit the target.
Now will he sit under a medlar tree, And wish his mistress were that kind of fruit
He will sit under a medlar tree, and wish that his mistress were some kind of fruit.
As maids call medlars when they laugh alone.
The same fruit that women often joke about as some kind of female genital looking thing.
O Romeo, that she were, O that she were An open-arse and thou a poperin pear!
Oh Romeo, I wish that she was! I wish that she was an open-arse a pop her in kind of a pear!
Romeo, good night. I’ll to my truckle-bed.
Romeo, good night. I will go to my truckle-bed.
This field-bed is too cold for me to sleep.
This field-bed is too cold for me to sleep.
Come, shall we go?
Come on Benvolio, shall we leave now?
Go then;
Yes, let’s go then.
for’tis in vain To seek him here that means not to be found.
It is in vain to look out for him because he does not want to be found.