Living

Odes 3.15: Uxor Pauperis Ibyci

by Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus) 65–8 BC

Translated by John Conington (3rd ed., before 1869) · From Odes, Book III

Living

Wife of Ibycus the poor,
Let aged scandals have at length their bound:
Give your graceless doings o'er,
Ripe as you are for going underground.
YOU the maidens' dance to lead,
And cast your gloom upon those beaming stars!
Daughter Pholoe may succeed,
But mother Chloris what she touches mars.
Young men's homes your daughter storms,
Like Thyiad, madden'd by the cymbals' beat:
Nothus' love her bosom warms:
She gambols like a fawn with silver feet.
Yours should be the wool that grows
By fair Luceria, not the merry lute:
Flowers beseem not wither'd brows,
Nor wither'd lips with emptied wine-jars suit.

MLA

Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus). “Odes 3.15: Uxor Pauperis Ibyci.” Translated by John Conington. Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/horace/70/.

Chicago

Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus). “Odes 3.15: Uxor Pauperis Ibyci.” Translated by John Conington. Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/horace/70/.

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