Book I, Elegy 6

Tullus, I fear not now to brave the Adrian waves with thee nor to spread my sails on the Aegean main; with thee I could scale the Rhipean heights or pass beyond the home of Memnon. But the words of my mistress as she hangs about my neck, her urgent prayers, her changing colour, all keep me back. All through the night she shrilly protests her love, and laments that she is left forlorn and that the gods are vanished out of heaven. Mine though she be, she will not yield herself, and uses all those threats that an aggrieved mistress will use to an angry lover. Not even an hour can I endure to live amid such complaints as these; perish the man that dares love unpassionately! Is it worth my while to visit learned Athens or to behold the ancient wealth of Asia, that Cynthia may upbraid me when my bark is launched and mar her face with passionate hands, and cry that she owes kisses to the wind that stays my journeying and that there is naught more cruel than a faithless lover?

Do thou strive to outdo thine uncle's well-earned rule and restore to the allies their long-forgotten rights. For thy youth has never yielded to love, and thy care has ever been for thy country's arms. Never may the accursed boy lay sorrows such as mine on thee, nor all the torments that my tears know well! Let me, whom Fortune hath ever willed to lie prostrate, yield up my life obedient to the worst her wantonness can demand. Many have gladly perished in gyves of love, that they have borne so long, and, when earth laps me round, let me be one of these. Nature has not fitted me for glory or for arms; Love's is the only warfare for which the Fates design me.

But thou, whether thy steps be cast where soft Ionia spreads its shores, or where Pactolus' stream steeps Lydia's ploughlands, whether thou rangest the land on foot or goest forth to lash the sea with oars, and makest one of those that rule and are loved by them they rule — then shalt thou be sure, if e'er a moment comes with memories of me, that I still live beneath a baleful star.