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(From Odes)
Translated by R. M. Hovenden
THEE, too, the mapper-out of seas and lands, | |
| The teller, bent unnumbered sands to count, | |
| A scanty heap of dust from pious hands, | |
| Archytas, holds beneath Matinus’ Mount. | |
| What profits it the heavens to explore, | 5 |
| To range from pole to pole, and then to die? | |
| So Tantalus, the guest of Gods no more, | |
| So died Tithonus, wafted to the sky, | |
| And Minos, councillor of Supreme Jove. | |
| Twice to the shades Panthoïdes returned, | 10 |
| Calling the witness of a shield to prove | |
| His fame, in Troy’s defence so dearly earned. | |
| He, as thou know’st, well skilled in Nature’s lore, | |
| Cast but the husks and shell of humankind; | |
| But death to us is blackness evermore, | 15 |
| None can retrace the path by fate assigned. | |
| The Furies offer some to cruel Mars, | |
| Others, seafaring men, the waves o’erwhelm, | |
| Old men and striplings crowd the funeral cars, | |
| No head escapes from harsh Proserpine’s realm. | 20 |
| Me, too, rough Notus drowned in Hadria’s tide | |
| What time Orion sheathed his sloping brand. | |
| O sailor-man, these bones, this skull to hide | |
| Grudge not a handful of the drifting sand; | |
| So may the East-wind on Venusia blow | 25 |
| And spare thee on the waters far away. | |
| Just guerdon for thy care may Jove bestow, | |
| And Neptune, guardian of Tarentum’s bay. | |
| But if thou turn a deaf ear to my prayer | |
| Surely thy children’s fortune shall be wrecked, | 30 |
| And thou, for lack of charity, shalt bear | |
| The just requital of a like neglect. | |
| No expiation shall undo the wrong, | |
| No lustral waters purify thy heart; | |
| The boon I ask will not delay thee long, | 35 |
| Three handfuls of gray dust, and then depart. | |
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