Odes

Horace

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

Ah, Postumus! they fleet away,

Our years, nor piety one hour

Can win from wrinkles and decay,

And Death's indomitable power;

Not though three hundred bullocks flame

Each year, to soothe the tearless king

Who holds huge Geryon's triple frame

And Tityos in his watery ring,

That circling flood, which all must stem,

Who eat the fruits that Nature yields,

Wearers of haughtiest diadem,

Or humblest tillers of the fields.

In vain we shun war's contact red

Or storm-tost spray of Hadrian main:

In vain, the season through, we dread

For our frail lives Scirocco's bane.

Cocytus' black and stagnant ooze

Must welcome you, and Danaus' seed

Ill-famed, and ancient Sisyphus

To never-ending toil decreed.