Social Commentaries
Book XI, 374
Translated by W. R. Paton (1916–18) · From The Greek Anthology (Loeb, vol. IV, 1918)
Make your fleshless cheeks always smooth with white lead, Laodice (just, indeed, is the penalty you pay the people), but never open your lips wide, for who by cosmetic fraud shall fix a row of teeth in it? You have shed all the beauty you had; loveliness of limb cannot be drawn from a perennial fountain. Like a rose you flourished in the spring ; now you are withered, dried by the parching summer of old age.
This translation is printed as prose in its source edition.
Cite this poem
MLA
Consul, Macedonius the. “Book XI, 374.” Translated by W. R. Paton. Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/macedonius/40/.
Chicago
Consul, Macedonius the. “Book XI, 374.” Translated by W. R. Paton. Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/macedonius/40/.
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