Odes

Horace

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

  1. While you for none were pining
  2. Sorer, nor Lydia after Chloe came,
  3. Lydia, her peers outshining,
  4. Might match her own with Ilia's Roman fame.
Horace
  1. Now Chloe is my treasure,
  2. Whose voice, whose touch, can make sweet music flow:
  3. For her I'd die with pleasure,
  4. Would Fate but spare the dear survivor so.
Lydia
  1. I love my own fond lover,
  2. Young Calais, son of Thurian Ornytus:
  3. For him I'd die twice over,
  4. Would Fate but spare the sweet survivor thus.
Horace
  1. What now, if Love returning
  2. Should pair us 'neath his brazen yoke once more,
  3. And, bright-hair'd Chloe spurning,
  4. Horace to off-cast Lydia ope his door?
Lydia
  1. Though he is fairer, milder,
  2. Than starlight, you lighter than bark of tree,
  3. Than stormy Hadria wilder,
  4. With you to live, to die, were bliss for me.