'Time now to sail': two versions

The ancient sailing season ran from April to November. Antipater's poem (2nd century BC) is a variation on that by Leonidas of Tarentum (3rd century BC). Appropriately, this pair of epigrams opens the tenth, 'protreptic' (advisory) book of the Anthology.

10.1

LEONIDAS

Time now to sail. The swallow has arrived 
To gossip to us in the pleasant breeze 
Of Zephyr, and the meadows are in bloom; 
The sea, just now whipped high in jagged squall,
Has fallen silent. Weigh the anchors then, 
Cast off, you mariner, and make all sail:
Priapus of the Anchorage so bids 
The merchantman to venture on his way.

10.2

ANTIPATER OF SIDON

This is the moment for the ship to race, 

And dash to foam a sea no longer scored 

By shivering billow as it surges by. 

The swallow curls her nest beneath the eaves; 

Fresh meadow-growth is smiling: so now coil 

Your dripping lines, you mariners, and weigh 

The anchors from their burrows in the hithes. 

Bowse up fresh canvas on the forestay line. 

Priapus of the Port, I so decree, 
The son of Bromius the boisterous.

Bromius (‘Roaring’) was an epithet of Dionysus.