HORACE

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HORACE Selected poems Bοοκ Xi Carpe Diem Leuconoe, don’t ask, we never know, what fate the gods grant us, whether your fate or mine, don’t waste your time on Babylonian, futile, calculations. How much better to suffer what happens, whether Jupiter gives us more winters or this is the last one, one debilitating the Tyrrhenian Sea on opposing cliffs. Be wise, and mix the wine, since time is short: limit that far-reaching hope. The envious moment is flying now, now, while we’re speaking: Seize the day, place in the hours that come as little faith as you can. Book:Xiii His Jealousy When you, Lydia, start to praise Telephus’ rosy neck, Telephus’ waxen arms, alas, my burning passion starts to mount deep inside me, with troubling anger. Neither my feelings, nor my hue stay as they were before, and on my cheek a tear slides down, secretly, proving how I’m consumed inwardly with lingering fires. I burn, whether it’s madhouse quarrels that have, drunkenly, marked your gleaming shoulders, or whether the crazed boy has placed a love-bite, in memory, on your lips. If you’d just listen to me now, you’d not bother to hope for constancy from him who wounds that sweet mouth, savagely, that Venus has imbued with her own pure nectar. Three times happy are they, and more, held by unbroken pledge, one which no destruction of love, by evil quarrels, will ever dissolve, before life’s final day. Book:Vii Tibur Let others sing in praise of Rhodes, or Mytilene, or Ephesus, or Corinth on the Isthmus, or Thebes that’s known for Bacchus, or Apollo’s isle of Delphi, or Thessalian Tempe. There’s some whose only purpose is to celebrate virgin Athene’s city forever, and set indiscriminately gathered olive on their heads. Many a poet in honour of Juno will speak fittingly of horses, Argos, rich Mycenae. As for me not even stubborn Sparta or the fields of lush Larisa are quite as striking, as Albunea’s echoing cavern, her headlong Anio, and the groves of Tiburnus, and Tibur’s orchards, white with flowing streams. Bright Notus from the south often blows away the clouds from dark skies, without bringing endless rain, so Plancus, my friend, remember to end a sad life and your troubles, wisely, with sweet wine, whether it’s the camp, and gleaming standards, that hold you or the deep shadows of your own Tibur. They say that Teucer, fleeing from Salamis and his father, still wreathed the garlands, leaves of poplar, round his forehead, flushed with wine, and in speech to his friends said these words to them as they sorrowed: ‘Wherever fortune carries us, kinder than my father, there, O friends and comrades, we’ll adventure! Never despair, if Teucer leads, of Teucer’s omens! Unerring Apollo surely promised, in the uncertain future, a second Salamis on a fresh soil. O you brave heroes, you who suffered worse with me often, drown your cares with wine: tomorrow we’ll sail the wide seas again.’

Selected poems

Bοοκ Xi Carpe Diem

Leuconoe, don’t ask,
we never know,
what fate the gods grant us,
whether your fate or mine,
don’t waste your time
on Babylonian,
futile, calculations.
How much better
to suffer what happens,
whether Jupiter gives us
more winters or this is the last one,
one debilitating the Tyrrhenian Sea
on opposing cliffs.
Be wise,
and mix the wine,
since time is short:
limit that far-reaching hope.
The envious moment
is flying now,
now,
while we’re speaking:
Seize the day,
place in the hours
that come
as little faith as you can.

Book:Xiii His Jealousy

When you, Lydia, start to praise
Telephus’ rosy neck, Telephus’ waxen arms,
alas, my burning passion starts
to mount deep inside me, with troubling anger.

Neither my feelings, nor my hue
stay as they were before, and on my cheek a tear
slides down, secretly, proving how
I’m consumed inwardly with lingering fires.

I burn, whether it’s madhouse
quarrels that have, drunkenly, marked your gleaming
shoulders, or whether the crazed boy
has placed a love-bite, in memory, on your lips.

If you’d just listen to me now,
you’d not bother to hope for constancy from him
who wounds that sweet mouth, savagely,
that Venus has imbued with her own pure nectar.

Three times happy are they, and more,
held by unbroken pledge, one which no destruction
of love, by evil quarrels,
will ever dissolve, before life’s final day.

Book:Vii Tibur

Let others sing in praise of Rhodes, or Mytilene,
or Ephesus, or Corinth on the Isthmus,
or Thebes that’s known for Bacchus, or Apollo’s isle
of Delphi, or Thessalian Tempe.

There’s some whose only purpose is to celebrate
virgin Athene’s city forever,
and set indiscriminately gathered olive on their heads.

Many a poet in honour of Juno
will speak fittingly of horses, Argos, rich Mycenae.
As for me not even stubborn Sparta
or the fields of lush Larisa are quite as striking,
as Albunea’s echoing cavern,
her headlong Anio, and the groves of Tiburnus,
and Tibur’s orchards, white with flowing streams.

Bright Notus from the south often blows away the clouds
from dark skies, without bringing endless rain,
so Plancus, my friend, remember to end a sad life
and your troubles, wisely, with sweet wine,
whether it’s the camp, and gleaming standards, that hold you
or the deep shadows of your own Tibur.

They say that Teucer, fleeing from Salamis and his
father, still wreathed the garlands, leaves of poplar,
round his forehead, flushed with wine, and in speech to his friends
said these words to them as they sorrowed:

‘Wherever fortune carries us, kinder than my father,
there, O friends and comrades, we’ll adventure!
Never despair, if Teucer leads, of Teucer’s omens!

Unerring Apollo surely promised,
in the uncertain future, a second Salamis
on a fresh soil. O you brave heroes, you
who suffered worse with me often, drown your cares with wine:
tomorrow we’ll sail the wide seas again.’