'Mid haunts of men. I, all ungracedBy gentle blood, I, whom you callYour friend, Maecenas, shall not tasteOf death, nor chafe in Lethe's thrall.E'en now a rougher skin expandsAlong my legs: above I changeTo a white bird; and o'er my handsAnd shoulders grows a plumage strange:Fleeter than Icarus, see me floatO'er Bosporus, singing as I go,And o'er Gaetulian sands remote,And Hyperborean fields of snow;By Dacian horde, that masks its fearOf Marsic steel, shall I be known,And furthest Scythian: Spain shall hearMy warbling, and the banks of Rhone.No dirges for my fancied death;No weak lament, no mournful stave;All clamorous grief were waste of breath,And vain the tribute of a grave.