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When youthful revellers, round the bowl,
Dilating, mingle soul with soul!
When I drink, the bliss is mine;
There's bliss in every drop of wine!
All other joys that I have known
I've scarcely dared to call my own;
But this the Fates can ne'er destroy,
Till death o'ershadows all my joy!

ODE L.

Μη με φυγης ορωσα.
(The 34th in Barnes.)

FLY not thus my brow of snow,
Lovely woman! fly not so.
Though the wane of age is mine,
Though the brilliant flush is thine,
Still I'm doom'd to sigh for thee,
Blest, if thou couldst sigh for me!
See, in yonder flowery braid,
Cull'd for thee, my blushing maid,
How the rose, of orient glow,
Mingles with the lily's snow;
Mark how sweet their tints agree,
Just, my girl, like thee and me!

LI.

Τι με τους νομους διδάσκεις.

(The 36th in Barnes.)

AWAY, away, you men of rules,

What have I to do with schools?

They'd make me learn, they'd make me think,

But would they make me love and drink?

Teach me this; and let me swim

My soul upon the goblet's brim;

Age begins to blanch my brow,

I've time for nought but pleasure now.

Fly and cool my goblet's glow

At yonder fountain's gelid flow;

I'll quaff, my boy, and calmly sink
This soul to slumber as I drink!
Soon, too soon, my jocund slave,

You'll deck your master's grassy grave;
And there's an end-for ah! you know
They drink but little wine below!

ODE LII.

Οτ' εγω νεων ὁμιλον.

(The 54th in Barnes.)

WHEN I behold the festive train
Of dancing youth, I'm young again!
Memory wakes her magic trance,
And wings me lightly through the dance.
Come, Cybeba, smiling maid!

Cull the flower and twine the braid;
Bid the blush of summer's rose

Burn upon my brow of snows;

And let me, while the wild and young
Trip the mazy dance along,
Fling my heap of years away,
And be as wild, as young as they.
Hither haste, some cordial soul!
Give my lips the brimming bowl;
Oh, you will see this hoary sage
Forget his locks, forget his age.
He still can chant the festive hymn,
He still can kiss the goblet's brim.

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Could any beast of vulgar vein
Undaunted thus defy the main ?
No he descends from climes above,
He looks the god, he breathes of Jove!

ODE LIV.

Στεφανηφόρου μετ' Ηρος.

(The 53d in Barnes.)

WHILE we invoke the wreathed Spring,
Resplendent rose! to thee we'll sing;
Resplendent rose, the flower of flowers,
Whose breath perfumes Olympus' bowers;
Whose virgin blush, of chasten'd dye,
Enchants so much our mortal eye.
When pleasure's bloomy season glows,
The Graces love to twine the rose;
The rose his warm Dione's bliss,
And flushes like Dione's kiss!
Oft has the poet's magic tongue
The rose's fair luxuriance sung;
And long the Muses, heavenly maids,
Have rear'd it in their tuneful shades.
When, at the early glance of morn,
It sleeps upon the glittering thorn,
'Tis sweet to dare the tangled fence,
To cull the timid floweret thence,
And wipe with tender hand away
The tear that on its blushes lay!
"Tis sweet to hold the infant stems,
Yet dropping with Aurora's gems,
And fresh inhale the spicy sighs
That from the weeping buds arise.
When revel reigns, when mirth is high,
And Bacchus beams in every eye,
Our rosy fillets scent exhale,
And fill with balm the fainting gale!
Oh there is nought in nature bright,
Where roses do not shed their light!
When morning paints the orient skies,
Her fingers burn with roseate dies;
The nymphs display the rose's charms,
It mantles o'er their graceful arms;
Through Cytherea's form it glows,
And mingles with the living snows,

The rose distils a healing balm,
The beating pulse of pain to calm;
Preserves the cold inurned clay,
And mocks the vestige of decay.
And when at length, in pale decline,
Its florid beauties fade and pine,
Sweet as in youth, its balmy breath
Diffuses odour even in death!

Oh! whence could such a plant have sprung?
Attend for thus the tale is sung.

When, humid, from the silvery stream,

Effusing beauty's warmest beam,

Venus appear'd, in flushing hues,

Mellow'd by ocean's briny dews;
When in the starry courts above
The pregnant brain of mighty Jove
Disclosed the nymph of azure glance,
The nymph who shakes the martial lance!
Then, then, in strange eventful hour,
The earth produced an infant flower,

Which sprung, with blushing tinctures drest,
And wanton'd o'er its parent breast.

The gods beheld this brilliant birth,
And hail'd the Rose, the boon of earth!
With nectar drops, a ruby tide,
The sweetly orient buds they dyed,
And bade them bloom, the flowers divine
Of him who sheds the teeming vine;
And bade them on the spangled thorn
Expand their bosoms to the morn.

ODE LV.

Ο τον εν πονοις ατειρη.
(The 50th in Barnes.)

HE who instructs the youthful crew
To bathe them in the brimmer's dew,
And taste, uncloy'd by rich excesses,
All the bliss that wine possesses !
He who inspires the youth to glance
In winged circlets through the dance;
Bacchus, the god again is here,
And leads along the blushing year!
The blushing year with rapture teems,
Ready to shed those cordial streams,

Which, sparkling in the cup of mirth,
Illuminate the sons of earth!

And when the ripe and vermil wine,
Sweet infant of the pregnant vine,
Which now in mellow clusters swells,
Oh! when it bursts its rosy cells,
The heavenly stream shall mantling flow
To balsam every mortal woe!

No youth shall then be wan or weak,
For dimpling health shall light the cheek;
No heart shall then desponding sigh,
For wine shall bid despondence fly!
Thus-till another autumn's glow
Shall bid another vintage flow!

ODE LVI.

Αρα τις τορευσε ποντον.
(The 51st in Barnes.)

AND whose immortal hand could shed
Upon this disk the ocean's bed?
And in a frenzied flight of soul
Sublime as heaven's eternal pole,
Imagine thus, in semblance warm,
The Queen of Love's voluptuous form
Floating along the silvery sea
In beauty's glorious majesty !

Light as the leaf that summer's breeze
Has wafted o'er the glassy seas,
She floats upon the ocean's breast,
Which undulates in sleepy rest,
And stealing on, she gently pillows
Her bosom on the dancing billows.
Her bosom, like the humid rose,
Her neck like dewy-sparkling snows,
Illume the liquid path she traces,
And burn within the streams embraces!
In languid luxury soft she glides,
Encircled by the azure tides,
Like some fair lily faint with weeping,
Upon a bed of violets sleeping!
Beneath their queen's inspiring glance
The dolphins o'er the green sea dance,
While, sparkling on the silver waves,
The tenants of the briny caves
Around the pomp in eddies play,
And gleam along the watery way.

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