Book IV, Elegy 5

May the earth cover thy tomb with thorns, thou bawd, and may thy shade be parched with thirst, for thirst thou hatest. May thy ghost find no rest among thine ashes, and may vengeful Cerberus fright thy dishonoured bones with hungry howl.

Skilled to win even Hippolytus that said "Nay" to love, and ever worst of omens to lovers' peace, she could force even Penelope to be deaf to rumours of her husband's safety and to wed with wanton Antinous. Should she will it, the magnet will refuse to draw the steel, and the bird prove a stepmother to her nestlings. Nay, did she bring herbs from the Colline field to the magic trench, things solid would dissolve into running water. She dared put spells upon the moon to do her bidding and to disguise her shape beneath the form of the night-prowling wolf, that by her cunning she might blind jealous husbands, and with her nails she tore out the undeserving eyes of crows; she consulted owls how she might have my blood, and gathered for my destruction the charm that drips from the pregnant mare.

She plied her task, alas! with flattering words, even as the persistent mole bores out its stony path. Thus would she speak: "If the golden shores of the Dorozantes delight thee, or the shell that flaunts its purple in the Tyrian sea, if Eurypylus' weft of Coan silk please thee or crumbling figures cut from coverlets of gold, or the wares sent from palm-bearing Thebes and myrrhine goblets baked in Parthian kilns, then spurn thine oath, and down with the gods! Let lies win the day! Break all the laws of chastity; they bring but loss! Feign that thou hast a husband; 'twill heighten thy price! Use every excuse! Love will return with added fire after a night's delay. If perchance he be angry and tear thy hair, his anger shall bring thee profit; after that thou must torment him till he purchase peace. Then when he has bought thine embraces and thou hast promised enjoyment of thy love, see that thou feign that the days of Isis are come, enjoining abstinence. Let Iole thrust on thy notice that April's Kalends are near, let Amycle din into thine ears that thy birthday falls on the Ides of May. He sits in supplication before thee. Take thy chair and write somewhat: if he trembles at these tricks thou hast him fast! Ever have fresh bites about thy throat, that he may deem to have been given in the strife of love. But delight not thou in the railing of importunate Medea — she was cast off that had dared be first to ask for love. But rather be costly Thais thy pattern, of whom Menander's wit hath told, when the harlot of the stage tricks the shrewd Scythian slaves. "Change thy ways to suit thy man. If he boasts his powers of song, accompany him and join thy drunken voice to his. Let thy porter be open-eyed for them that bring gifts; if he that knocks be empty-handed, let him sleep on, propped on the bar that is drawn across the door. Nor would I have thee spurn soldiers not made for love, nor sailors, if their horny hands bring coin, nor yet one of those on whose barbarian necks the salesman's bill has hung, when with whitened feet they danced in the market-place. Look to the gold, not to the hand that brings it. Though thou give ear to their verse, what will be thine save empty words? "What boots it, light of my life, to go forth with locks adorned, and to rustle in slender folds of Coan silk?" Who brings thee verse yet never a gift of Coan raiment, let his lyre meet with deaf ears, since it brings no pelf. While spring is in the blood and thy years know not wrinkles, use thy time, lest the morrow take toll of thy beauty! I have seen the rose-beds of perfumed Paestum that should have lived lie blasted at morn by the Scirocco's breath."

While thus Acanthis plied my mistress' soul, all my bones might be counted beneath the shrunken skin. But do thou, Queen Venus, receive my thank-offering, a ring-dove's throat cut before thine altar. I saw the cough clot in her wrinkled throat, and the bloodstained spittle trickle through her hollow teeth. I saw her breathe out her plague-struck spirit on the blankets that were once her father's: the hearth was chill and the broken shed where she lay shivered for cold. For pomp of funeral she had but the stolen bands that bound her scanty hair, a mutch with colour dimmed by foul neglect; and the dog that of old was over-wakeful for my woes, when with stealthy fingers I had to slip the bolts that barred the door. Let the bawd's tomb be an old wine-jar with broken neck, and over it, wild fig-tree, put thou forth thy might. Whoe'er thou art that lovest, batter this grave with jagged stones, and mingled with the stones add words of cursing!