C.D. Warner, et al., comp. The Library of the World’s Best Literature.
An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.
Written in Sickness at Corcyra
By Tibullus (c. 5519 B.C.)
T
Messala; yet by thee and all thy band
I pray that I may still remembered be,
Lingering on lone Phæacia’s foreign strand.
My charrèd bones in sorrow’s lap to lay:
Oh, spare! for here I have no sister dear
To shower Assyrian odors o’er my clay,
And pour the tear of tender piety;
Nor Delia, who, ere yet I quitted Rome,
’Tis said consulted all the gods on high.
Thrice from the streets he brought her omens sure.
All smiled: but tears would still her cheeks bedew;
Naught could her thoughts from that sad journey lure.
Yet anxiously I yearned for more delay.
Dire omens now, now inauspicious birds,
Detained me, now old Saturn’s baleful day.
My awkward feet had stumbled at the door!
Enough: if lover heed not Cupid’s frown,
His headstrong ways he’ll bitterly deplore.
Her brazen sistra clashed so oft by thee?
What, while thou didst before her altars bow,
Thy pure lavations and thy chastity?
Full many a tablet proves thy power to heal;
So Delia shall, in linen robes arrayed,
Her vows before thy holy threshold seal.
’Mid Pharian crowds conspicuous she’ll return;
But let me still my father’s gods adore,
And to the old Lar his monthly incense burn.
Ere roads had intersected hill and dale!
No pine had then the azure wave disdained,
Or spread the swelling canvas to the gale.
From foreign climes a cargo homeward bore;
No sturdy steer beneath the yoke had bent,
No galling bit the conquered courser wore.
Was reared to mark the limits of the plain;
The oaks ran honey, and all uncontrolled
The fleecy ewes brought milk to glad the swain.
The cruel smith had never forged the spear:
Now Jove is King,—the seeds of bale are sown,
Scars, wounds, and shipwrecks, thousand deaths loom near.
Distract my heart with agonizing woe;
No impious words by me have uttered been,
Against the gods above or gods below.
Upon my stone these lines engraven be:—
“H
W
Will Venus waft to blest Elysium’s plains,
Where dance and song resound, and every grove
Rings with clear-throated warblers’ dulcet strains.
Here sweetest cassia all untended grows;
With lavish lap the earth, in every field,
Outpours the blossom of the fragrant rose.
In love’s sweet lures, and pay the untiring vow;
Here reigns the lover, slain in youthhood’s prime,
With myrtle garland round his honored brow.
Low lies, and pitchy rivers round it roar;
There serpent-haired Tisiphone doth yell,
And lash the damnéd crew from shore to shore.
Whose hideous howls the brazen portals close;
There lewd Ixion, Juno’s tempter, bound,
Spins round his wheel in endless unrepose.
On whose black entrails vultures ever prey;
And Tantalus is there, ’mid waves that rise
To mock his misery, and rush away.
Fill on, and bear their piercèd pails in vain—
There writhe the wretch who’s wronged a love of mine,
And wished me absent on a long campaign!
To shield thy maiden fame, around thee tread,
Tell thee sweet tales, and by the lamp’s bright glare
From the full distaff draw the lengthening thread.
Sleep-worn, by slow degrees their work lay by,
Oh, let me speed unheralded to thee,
Like an immortal rushing down the sky!
And feet unsandaled, meet me on my way!
Aurora, goddess of the morning beam,
Bear, on thy rosy steeds, that happy day!