Odes

Horace

Horace. The Odes and Carmen Saeculare of Horace. Conington, John, translator. London: George Bell and Sons, 1882.

  • Mercury has folded with the sons of night,
  • Untaught to prayer Fate's prison to unseal.
  • Ah, heavy grief! but patience makes more light
  • What sorrow may not heal.
  • The Muses love me: fear and grief,
  • The winds may blow them to the sea;
  • Who quail before the wintry chief
  • Of Scythia's realm, is nought to me.
  • What cloud o'er Tiridates lowers,
  • I care not, I. O, nymph divine
  • Of virgin springs, with sunniest flowers
  • A chaplet for my Lamia twine,
  • Pimplea sweet! my praise were vain
  • Without thee. String this maiden lyre,
  • Attune for him the Lesbian strain,
  • O goddess, with thy sister quire!
  • What, fight with cups that should give joy?
  • 'Tis barbarous; leave such savage ways
  • To Thracians. Bacchus, shamefaced boy,
  • Is blushing at your bloody frays.