Summer's Revel

Oh! but my mind is weary!
Long I have conned the dreary
Tomes of Aratus.
Surely 'tis time to play now!
Ho! to the fields away now!
Shall we not live to-day now?
What though dull fools berate us!

What is the use of learning,
When it but brings new yearning
Problems to tease us?
When, or at eve or morning,
Soon, but without a warning,
Pleadings and pity scorning,
Orcus the dark shall seize us.

Corydon, lead the way, and
Find where good wine's to pay, and
Cool me a flagon!
Then in vine-trellised bowers,
Bedded on thick-strewn flowers,
Hours upon idle hours
Sweetly shall haste or lag on.

Buy me no meat, but mellow
Apricots, melons yellow,
Cream, and strawberries.
These have the sweetest savor
Eaten in forest cave, or
Lying by brooks that rave or
Streamlet that singing tarries.

Now in my youth's fresh buoyance
Laughter shall wait on joyance,
Wine shall flow fast now;
Lest, when my life grows colder,
Sickness, by age made bolder,
Say, as he taps my shoulder:
"Come, friend — you've drunk your last now."