Part 4

Oh, daughter, lovelier than your lovely mother, Whatever punishment you may desire Give my offending verses; in the fire Throw them, please you, or in the Adriatic. Not Dindymene, no, nor even Apollo So shakes the minds of priests within the shrine; Nor so disturbing is the God of wine, Nor Corybantes doubling their shrill cymbals, As direful fits of anger that are frightened Neither by Noric sword nor savage flame, Nor by ship-wrecking seas, nor them can tame Great Jupiter himself, with all his thunders. To our original clay, they say Prometheus Was forced to add a portion he had made Of bits from every creature, and he laid In human hearts rage from the furious lion. With crushing ruin rage destroyed Thyestes; And as a final cause rage may be known Why mighty cities fell, quite overthrown, And why upon their walls a sneering army Its plowshare drags along. But keep your temper! Me, too in my sweet youth a frenzied heart Has tempted sorely, and its maddening dart Has driven me to write impetuous verses To change sad things for brighter I am seeking, And since my offending verses I retract, I beg of you in turn a friendly act, That you again to me your heart give over.

_LASTING FAME. III-30_

A monument outlasting brass I have builded, Higher than pyramids in their crumbling glory, That no devouring storm, nor futile North wind Can overthrow, nor years in long succession, Nor fleeting seasons. I shall not wholly perish. In great part I'll escape the funeral pyre; And lately praised, my praise will go on growing To latest years. As long as Priest and Vestal Ascend the Capitol, I shall be mentioned Where Aufidus fierce rages, and where Daunus A rustic race rules in an arid country. Great, though of humble birth, I the first poet To write in Latin rhythms AEolian lyrics, Take pride, Melpomene, in well-earned merits, And crown me willingly with Delphic laurel.

_RELIGION. I-34_

God's mean and careless servant--while I wander Deep in the madness of Philosophy,-- Now backward I must set my sail, and ponder Where my forsaken course retraced shall be. For Jupiter, who with his glittering fire So often cleaves apart the threatening clouds, His winged car and thundering horses higher Toward air has driven where no shadow shrouds.

Whereat the sluggish earth, each vagrant river,-- The Styx, and hated Taenarus' dread abode, And the Atlantic borders shake and shiver. Ah--to reverse high things and low, our God Is able, and the mighty he can lower, The obscure can raise. From this man Fortune steals The crown to give to that one;--in her power, Showing with hissing wings the joy she feels.

TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES:

Passages in italics are indicated by _italics_.

Inconsistencies in spelling and hyphenation have been retained from the original.

Inconsistencies between the poem titles in the Table of Contents and the titles of the poems in the text have been retained from the original except as follows:

"The Raven" in the Table of Contents changed to "The Rover"

Obvious typographical errors have been corrected as follows:

Page 32: "Rememeber" changed to "Remember" Page 37: "everyhing" changed to "everything"

End of Project Gutenberg's Memorial Day and Other Verse, by Helen Leah Reed