Horace at your back vii: only one thing

     You occupy the nest; I praise
     the brooks of the lovely coun-
     tryside, its woodland and rocks
     overgrown with moss. In short, 
     I know life and am a king of the
     moment, I leave behind those
     things you extol to the heavens
     with loud applause, and, like the
     slave who refuses the sacrificial
     cakes from his master the priest,
     it is bread I want and now prefer ..

     I am dictating these lines to
     you behind Vacuna's crumbling
     shrine, happy in everything
     else apart from not having 
     your company to share.



I like it, that one
studies pretty stren-
uously with this son
of a slave. I like it,
that there is always
more. I like it, that
so many of the minds
I admire, walk around
in his consciousness.
The rigor they accept
is infectious, a bond.







  Through the years, the 
  hexameters, flows an  
  uncanny demonstration. 
  The strain is nothing.  
  One is being imagined.































Horace
20 BC
John Davie
  translation
Satires and Epistles
  Epistles I, 10
op. cit.