Book I, Elegy 3: The Poet Sick: To Messalla (Postgate)

Without me will ye go, Messalla, across the Aegean wave, yet thinking, oh, I pray, both chief and staff of me. Phaeacia holds me back, sick in a foreign land. Keep off thy greedy hands, I pray, black Death. Black Death, I pray thee keep them off No mother have I here to gather the burned bones to her grieving bosom ; no sister to lavish Assyrian perfumes on my ashes and weep with hair dishevelled by my tomb. Nor any Delia, who, ere from the city she let me go, inquired, they say, of every god. From the boy's hands thrice did she lift a sacred lot, and from the three did the boy make answer to her that all was sure.

All promised a return ; yet did nothing stay her from looking back in tears and terror on my journey. Yea, even I her comforter, after I had given my parting charge, sought still in my disquiet for reasons to linger and delay. Either birds or words of evil omen were my pretexts, or there was the holy day of Saturn to detain me. How often, when my foot was on the road, said I that, stumbling at the gate, it had warned me of disaster ! Let no man venture to depart when Love says nay ; else shall he learn that a god forbade his going.

What help is there now for me in thy Isis, Delia ? what help in the bronze that was clashed so often in thy hands ? Or what avails it that in thy dutiful observance of her rites, as I remember well, thou didst bathe in clean water and sleep apart in a clean bed ?

Now aid me, goddess, now — that thou canst heal saith a crowd of painted panels in thy temples — that my Delia may pay the nightly vigils of her vow, sitting all swathed in linen before thy holy door, and twice in the day be bound to chaunt thy praise with loosened tresses for all to mark amid the Pharian throng. And be it mine many times to stand before the shrine of my sires' Penates and offer incense, as the months come round, to the old Lar of my home.

How well lived folk in olden days when Saturn was the king, before the earth was opened out for distant travel ! Not as yet had the pine-tree learned to swim the blue sea wave or surrendered the spreading sail to belly before the wind ; nor, seeking gain in unknown lands, had the vagrant seaman loaded his bark with foreign wares. That was a time when the sturdy bull had not bent his neck to the yoke, nor the tamed horse champed the bit. No house had doors ; no stone was planted on the land to set fixed boundaries to men's estates. The very oaks gave honey; and with milky udders came the ewes unbidden to meet the careless swain. Then were no marshalled hosts, no lust of blood, no battles ; no swords had been forged by the cruel armourer's ruthless skill. But now that Jupiter is lord, there are wounds and carnage without cease ; now the sea slays, and a thousand ways of sudden death.

Spare me, Sire. No broken oaths make me to fear and tremble, no wicked speech against the holy gods. But if even now I have fulfilled my destined span, let a stone be set above my bones, graven with this legend :

HERE LIES TIBULLUS, RAVISHED BY DEATH'S HAND, MESSALLA COMRADING o'er SEA AND LAND.

But me, for I have been ever pliable to gentle Love, shall Venus' self escort to the Elysian fields. There never flags the dance. The birds fly here and there, fluting sweet carols from their slender throats. Untilled the field bears cassia, and through all the land with scented roses blooms the kindly earth. Troops of young men meet in sport with gentle maidens, and Love never lets his warfare cease. There are all, on whom Death swooped because of love ; on their hair are myrtle garlands for all to see.

But the Wicked Place lies buried in the gulf of night ; and round it black rivers roar. There storms Tisiphone, wild snakes her unkempt hair; and this way and that way flees the godless crowd. Then at the gate upon black Cerberus hiss his wride-mouthed snakes as he keeps his sentry-watch before the doors of bronze. There is Ixion, who dared to offer force to Juno : on the swift wheel whirl his guilty limbs. And there is Tityos stretched over nine roods of land ; on his black vitals feed the birds that never tire. There too is Tantalus, and pools around him ; but on the instant, ere he drinks, the wave flies from his raging thirst. And the offspring of Danaus for slighting the godhead of Venus carry the waters of Lethe into leaking butts. There let all be who have profaned my love and who have wished me lingering campaigns.

But thou, I pray, continue chaste. Let the aged dame sit ever by thy side to keep thy honour true. She shall tell thee stories when the lamp is in its place, as she draws the long yarn from the loaded distaff, while all around the maids bend over the toilsome task till sleep steals upon them and the work drops from the tired hand. Then of a sudden let me come, and no one bring the news of me ; but may I seem to have come from heaven to thy side. Then, just as thou art, with long hair all disordered and feet unsandalled, run to meet me, Delia. For this I pray ; thus may that radiant Day-star bless my sight, borne by the rosy horses of the shining Dawn