Book I: Elegy the Seventh: A Desperate Expedient

Thou beckonest ever with a face all smiles,Then, God of Love, thou lookest fierce and pale.Unfeeling boy! why waste on me such wiles?What glory if a god o'er man prevails?

Once more thy snares are set. My Delia fliesTo steal a night--with whom I cannot tell.Can I believe when she denies, denies--I, for whose sake she tricked her lord so well?

By me, alas! those cunning ways were shownTo fool her slaves. My skill I now deplore!For me she made excuse to sleep alone,Or silenced the shrill hinges of her door.

"Twas I prescribed what remedies to useIf mutual passion somewhat fiercely play;If there were tell-tale bite or rosy bruise,I showed what simples take the scars away.

Hear me! fond husband of the false and fair,Make me thy guest, and she shall chastely go!When she makes talk with men I shall take care,Nor shall she at the wine her bosom show.

I shall take care she does not nod or smileTo any other, nor her hand imbueWith his fast-flowing wine, that her swift guileMay scribble on the board their rendez-vous.

When she goes out, beware! And if she hieTo Bona Dea, where no males may be,Straight to the sacred altars follow I,Who only trust her if my eyes can see.

Oh! oft I pressed that soft hand I adore,Feigning with some rare ring or seal to play,And plied thee with strong wine till thou didst snore,While I, with wine and water, won the day.

I wronged thee, aye! But 'twas not what I meant.Forgive, for I confess. 'Twas Cupid's spellO'er-swayed me. Who can foil a god's intent?Now have I courage all my deeds to tell.

Yes, it was I, unblushing I declare.At whom thy watch-dog all night long did bay:--But some-one else now stands insistent there,Or peers about him and then walks away.

He seems to pass. But soon will backward fareAlone, and, coughing, at the threshold hide.What skill hath stolen love! Beware, beware!Thy boat is drifting on a treacherous tide.

What worth a lovely wife, if others buyThy treasure, if thy stoutest bolt betrays,If in thy very arms she breathes a sighFor absent joy, and feigns a slight malaise?

Give her in charge to me! I will not spareA master's whip. Her chain shall constant be.While thou mayst go abroad and have no careWho trims his curls, or flaunts his toga free.

Whatever beaux accost her, all is well!Not the least hint of scandal shall be made.For I will send them far away, to tellIn some quite distant street their amorous trade.

All this a god decrees; a sibyl wiseIn prophet-song did this to me proclaim;Who when Bellona kindles in her eyes,Fears neither twisted scourge nor scorching flame.

Then with a battle-axe herself will scarHer own wild arms, and sprinkle on the groundBlood, for Bellona's emblems of wild war,Swift-flowing from the bosom's gaping wound.

A barb of iron rankles in her breast,As thus she chants the god's command to all:"Oh, spare a beauty by true love possessed,Lest some vast after-woe upon thee fall!

"For shouldst thou win her, all thy power will fail,As from this wound flows forth the fatal gore,Or as these ashes cast upon the gale,Are scattered far and kindled never more."

And, O my Delia, the fierce prophetessTold dreadful things that on thy head should fall:--I know not what they were--but none the lessI pray my darling may escape them all.

Not for thyself do I forgive thee, no!'Tis thy sweet mother all my wrath disarms,--That precious creature, who would come and go,And lead thee through the darkness to my arms.

Though great the peril, oft the silent dameWould join our hands together, and all nightWait watching on the threshold till I came,Nor ever failed to know my steps aright.

Long be thy life! dear, kind and faithful heart!Would it were possible my life's whole yearWere at the friendly hearth-stone where thou art!'Tis for thy sake I hold thy daughter dear.

Be what she will, she is not less thy child.Oh, teach her to be chaste! Though well she knowsNo free-born fillet binds her tresses wildNor Roman stole around her ankles flows!

My lot is servile too. Whate'er I seeOf beauty brings her to my fevered eye.If I should be accused of crime, or beDragged up the steep street, by the hair, to die:--

Even then there were no fear that I should layRude hands on thee my sweet! for if o'erswayedBy such blind frenzy in an evil day,I should bewail the hour my hands were made.

Yet would I have thee chaste and constant be,Not with a fearful but a faithful heart;And that in thy fond breast the love of meBurn but more fondly when we live apart.

She who was never faithful to a friendWill come to age and misery, and windWith tremulous ringer from her distaff's endThe ever-twisting wool; and she will bind

Upon her moving looms the finished thread,Or clean and pick the long skeins white as snow.And all her fickle gallants when they wed,Will say, "That old one well deserves her woe."

Venus from heaven will note her flowing tear:"I smile not on the faithless," she will say.Her curse on others fall! O, Delia dear!Let us teach true love to grow old and gray!