To Delius

Firm be thy soul!--serene in power,
When adverse fortune clouds the sky;
Undazzled by the triumph’s hour,
Since, Delius, thou must die--

Alike, if still to grief resign’d,
Or if, through festal days, ’tis thine
To quaff, in grassy haunts reclined,
The old Falernian wine--

Haunts where the silvery poplar-boughs
Love with the pine’s to blend on high,
And some clear fountain brightly flows
In graceful windings by.

There be the rose with beauty fraught,
So soon to fade, so brilliant now;
There be the wine, the odours brought,
While time and fate allow!

For thou, resigning to thine heir
Thy halls, thy bowers, thy treasured store,
Must leave that home, those woodlands fair,
On yellow Tiber’s shore.

What then avails it, if thou trace
From Inachus thy glorious line?
Or, sprung from some ignoble race,
If not a roof be thine?

Since the dread lot for all must leap
Forth from the dark revolving urn,
And we must tempt the gloomy deep,
Whence exiles ne’er return.