Ο δραπετας μ' ὁ χρυσος.
(The 65th in Barnes.)
WHEN gold, as fleet as zephyr's pinion,
Escapes like any faithless minion,
And flies me, (as he flies me ever,)
Do I pursue him? never, never!
No, let the false deserter go,
For who would court his direst foe?
But when I feel my lighten'd mind
No more by ties of gold confined,
I loosen all my clinging cares
And cast them to the vagrant airs.
Then, then I feel the Muse's spell,
And wake to life the dulcet shell;
The dulcet shell to beauty sings,
And love dissolves along the strings!
Thus, when my heart is sweetly taught
How little gold deserves a thought,
The winged slave returns once more,
And with him wafts delicious store
Of racy wine, whose balmy art
In slumber seals the anxious heart!
Again he tries my soul to sever
From love and song, perhaps for ever!
Away, deceiver! why pursuing
Ceaseless thus my heart's undoing?
Sweet is the song of loving fire;
Sweet are the sighs that thrill the lyre;
Oh! sweeter far than all the gold
The waftage of thy wings can hold.
I well remember all thy wiles;
They wither'd Cupid's flowery smiles.
And o'er his harp such garbage shed,
I thought its angel breath was fled !
They tainted all his bowl of blisses,
His bland desires and hallow'd kisses.
Oh! fly to haunts of sordid men,
But rove not near the bard again!
Thy glitter in the Muse's shade
Scares from her bower the tuneful maid;
And not for worlds would I forego
That moment of poetic glow,
When my full soul in Fancy's stream,
Pours o'er the lyre its swelling theme.
Away, away! to worldlings hence
Who feel not this diviner sense,
And with thy gay, fallacious blaze
Dazzle their unrefined gaze.
Τον μελανόχρωτα βοτρυν.
(The 52d in Barnes.)
SABLED by the solar beam,
Now the fiery clusters teem,
In osier baskets, borne along
By all the festal vintage throng
Of rosy youths and virgins fair,
Ripe as the melting fruits they bear.
Now, now they press the pregnant grapes,
And now the captive stream escapes,
In fervid tide of nectar gushing,
And for its bondage proudly blushing!
While round the vat's impurpled brim
The choral song, the vintage hymn
Of rosy youths and virgins fair
Steals on the cloy'd and panting air.
Mark how they drink, with all their eyes,
The orient tide that sparkling flies;
The infant balm of all their fears,
The infant Bacchus, born in tears!
When he whose verging years decline
As deep into the vale as mine,
When he inhales the vintage-spring,
His heart is fire, his foot's a wing;
And as he flies, his hoary hair
Plays truant with the wanton air!
Ανα βαρβιτον δονήσω.
(The 64th in Barnes.)
AWAKE to life, my dulcet shell,
To Phoebus all thy sighs shall swell;
And though no glorious prize be thine,
No Pythian wreath around thee twine,
Yet every hour is glory's hour
To him who gathers wisdom's flower!
Then wake thee from thy magic slumbers,
Breathe to the soft and Phrygian numbers,
Which, as my trembling lips repeat,
Thy chords shall echo back as sweet.
The cygnet thus, with fading notes,
As down Cayster's tide he floats,
Plays with his snowy plumage fair
Upon the wanton murmuring air,
Which amorously lingers round,
And sighs responsive sound for sound!
Muse of the Lyre! illume my dream,
Thy Phœbus is my fancy's dream;
And hallow'd is the harp I bear,
And hallow'd is the wreath I wear,
Hallow'd by him, the god of lays,
Who modulates the choral maze!
I sing the love which Daphne twined
Around the godhead's yielding mind;
I sing the blushing Daphne's flight
From this ethereal youth of light;
And how the tender, timid maid
Flew panting to the kindly shade,
Resign'd a form too tempting fair,
And grew a verdant laurel there:
Whose leaves, with sympathetic thrill,
In terror seem'd to tremble still!
The god pursued, with wing'd desire;
And when his hopes were all on fire,
He only heard the pensive air
Whispering amid her leafy hair!
But, O my soul! no more-no more!
Enthusiast, whither do I soar?
This sweetly-mad'ning dream of soul
Has hurried me beyond the goal.
Why should I sing the mighty darts
Which fly to wound celestial hearts,
When sure the lay, with sweeter tone,
Can tell the darts that wound my own?
Still be Anacreon, still inspire
The descant of the Teian lyre:
Still let the nectar'd numbers float,
Distilling love in every note!
And when the youth, whose burning soul
Has felt the Paphian star's control,
When he the liquid lays shall hear,
His heart will flutter to his ear,
And drinking there of song divine,
Banquet on intellectual wine!
Πολιοι μεν ἡμιν ηδε.
(The 56th in Barnes.)
GOLDEN hues of youth are fled;
Hoary locks deform my head.
Bloomy graces, dalliance gay,
All the flowers of life decay,
Withering age begins to trace
Sad memorials o'er my face;
Time has shed its sweetest bloom,
All the future must be gloom!
This awakes my hourly sighing;
Dreary is the thought of dying!
Pluto's is a dark abode,
Sad the journey, sad the road:
And, the gloomy travel o'er,
Ah! we can return no more!
Αγε δη, φερ' ἡμιν, ω παι.
(The 57th in Barnes.)
FILL me, boy, as deep a draught
As e'er was fill'd, as e'er was quaff'd ;
But let the water amply flow
To cool the grape's intemperate glow;
For though the bowl's the grave of sadness,
Oh! be it ne'er the birth of madness!
No, banish from our board to-night
The revelries of rude delight!
To Scythians leave these wild excesses,
Ours be the joy that soothes and blesses!
And while the temperate bowl we wreathe,
Our choral hymns shall sweetly breathe,
Beguiling every hour along
With harmony of soul and song!
Τον Ερωτα γαρ τον ἁβρον.
(The 58th in Barnes.)
To Love, the soft and blooming child,
I touch the harp in descant wild;
To Love, the babe of Cyprian bowers,
The boy who breathes and blushes flowers!
To Love, for heaven and earth adore him,
And gods and mortals bow before him!
Γουνουμαι σ' ελαφηβολε.
(The 60th in Barnes.)
HASTE thee, nymph, whose winged spear
Wounds the fleeting mountain-deer!
Dian, Jove's immortal child,
Huntress of the savage wild!
Goddess with the sun-bright hair!
Listen to a people's prayer.
Turn to Lethe's river, turn,
There thy vanquish'd people mourn!
Come to Lethe's wavy shore,
There thy people's peace restore.
Thine their hearts, their altars thine;
Dian! must they must they pine?
Εγω δ' ουτ' αν Αμαλθειης.
(The 68th in Barnes.)
RICH in bliss, I proudly scorn
The stream of Amalthea's horn!
Nor should I ask to call the throne
Of the Tartessian prince my own;
To totter through his train of years,
The victim of declining fears.
One little hour of joy to me
Is worth a dull eternity!
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