Odes

Horace

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

  • Come, tell me what barbarian fair
  • Will serve you now, her bridegroom slain?
  • What page from court with essenced hair
  • Will tender you the bowl you drain,
  • Well skill'd to bend the Serian bow
  • His father carried? Who shall say
  • That rivers may not uphill flow,
  • And Tiber's self return one day,
  • If you would change Panaetius' works,
  • That costly purchase, and the clan
  • Of Socrates, for shields and dirks,
  • Whom once we thought a saner man?
  • Come, Cnidian, Paphian Venus, come,
  • Thy well-beloved Cyprus spurn,
  • Haste, where for thee in Glycera's home
  • Sweet odours burn.
  • Bring too thy Cupid, glowing warm,
  • Graces and Nymphs, unzoned and free,
  • And Youth, that lacking thee lacks charm,
  • And Mercury.