Odes by Horace

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THE ODES AND CARMEN SAECULARE OF HORACE

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QUID FLES, ASTERIE.


Why
weep for him whom sweet Favonian airs Will waft next spring, Asteria, back to you,

Rich with Bithynia's wares, A lover fond and true,

Your Gyges? He, detain'd by stormy stress

At Oricum, about the Goat-star's rise, Cold, wakeful, comfortless, The long night weeping lies.

Meantime his lovesick hostess' messenger

Talks of the flames that waste poor Chloe's heart

(Flames lit for you, not her!) With a besieger's art;

Shows how a treacherous woman's lying breath

Once on a time on trustful Proetus won

To doom to early death
Too chaste Bellerophon;

Warns him of Peleus' peril, all but slain

For
virtuous scorn of fair Hippolyta, And tells again each tale

That e'er led heart astray.

In vain; for deafer than Icarian seas

He hears, untainted yet. But, lady fair,

What if Enipeus please
Your listless eye? beware!

Though true it be that none with surer seat

O'er Mars's grassy turf is seen to ride,

Nor any swims so fleet
Adown the Tuscan tide,

Yet keep each evening door and window barr'd;

Look not abroad when music strikes up shrill,

And though he call you hard, Remain obdurate still.





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