Odes 2.3 (Martin): Aequam, Memento

Let not the frowns of fate
Disquiet thee, my friend,
Nor, when she smiles on thee, do thou, elate
With vaunting thoughts, ascend
Beyond the limits of becoming mirth,
For, Dellius, thou must die, become a clod of earth!

'Whether thy days go down
In gloom, and dull regrets,
Or, shunning life's vain struggle for renown,
Its fever and its frets,
Stretch'd on the grass, with old Falernian wine.
Thou giv'st the thoughtless hours a rapture all divine.

Where the tall spreading pine,
And white-leaved poplar grow,
And mingling their broad boughs in leafy twine,
A grateful shadow throw,
Where runs the wimpling brook, its slumb'rous tune
Still murmuring, as it runs, to the hush'd ear of noon;

There wine, there perfumes bring,
Bring garlands of the rose,
Fair and too short-lived daughter of the spring,
While youth's bright current flows
Within thy veins, — ere yet hath come the hour,
When the dread sisters three shall clutch thee in their power.

Thy woods, thy treasured pride,
Thy mansion's pleasant seat,
Thy lawns washed by the Tiber's yellow tide,
Each favourite retreat.
Thou must leave all, — all, and thine heir shall run
In riot through the wealth thy years of toil have won.

It recks not, whether thou
Be opulent, and trace
Thy birth from kings, or bear upon thy brow
Stamp of a beggar's race;
Be what thou wilt, full surely must thou fall,
For Orcus, ruthless king, swoops equally on all.

Yes, all are hurrying fast
To the one common bourne;
Sooner or later will the lot at last '
Drop from the fatal urn,
Which sends thee hence in the grim Stygian bark,
To dwell forevermore in cheerless realms and dark.