Book III, Epigram 50 (Ker)

This, no other, is your reason for inviting me to dine, that you may recite your verses, Ligurinus. I have put off my shoes; at once a huge volume is brought along with the lettuce and the fish sauce. A second is read through while the first course stands waiting; there is a third, and the dessert does not yet appear; and you recite a fourth, and finally a fifth book. Sickening is a boar if you serve it to me so often. If you don't consign your accursed poems to the mackerel, in future, Ligurinus, you shall dine at home alone.