Martial Epigrams 10.47

Vitam quae faciant beatiorem,
Iucundissime Martialis, haec sunt:
Res non parta labore, sed relicta;
Non ingratus ager, focus perennis;
Lis numquam, toga rara, mens quieta;
Vires ingenuae, salubre corpus;
Prudens simplicitas, pares amici;
Convictus facilis, sine arte mensa;
Nox non ebria, sed soluta curis;
Non tristis torus, et tamen pudicus;
Somnus, qui faciat breves tenebras:
Quod sis esse velis nihilque malis;
Summum nec metuas diem nec optes. 

My carefree Namesake, this the art
Shall lead thee to life's happier part: 

A competence inherited, not won,
Productive acres & a constant home;

No courts, few formal days, your mind stable,
A native vigor in a healthy frame; 

A tact in candor, friendships on a par,
Convivial courtesies, a plain table;

A night, not drunken, yet shall banish care,
A bed, not frigid, yet not one of shame;
A sleep that makes the dark hours shorter: 

Prefer your state & hanker for none other,
Nor fear, nor seek to meet, your final hour. 

translated by Peter Whigham ( Epigrams of Martial: Englished by Divers Hands, J.P. Sullivan and Peter Whigham, eds., University of California Press, 1987, 374-375)

 & by Fred Chappell, C: Poems by Fred Chappell, LSU Press, Baton Rouge and London, 1993, 'How to Do It'

"Chappell--you who love to jest--

Hear the things that make life blest:

Family money not got by earning;

A fertile farm, a hearthfire burning;

No lawsuits and no formal dress;

A healthy body and a mind at peace;

Friends whom tactful frankness pleases;

Good meal without exotic sauces;

Sober nights that still spark life;

A faithful yet a sexy wife;

Sleep that makes the darkness brief;

Contentment with what you plainly need;

A death not longed for, but without dread."

(Sober nights that still spark life; A faithful yet a sexy wife -- this is Martial!  What a great rendition of these two lines.)

 

(I posted the following poem to celebrate the old Roman New Year, the first day of March.  It has a khayyamic ring here and there.)

Horace, Odes 4.7

The snows are fled away, leaves on the shaws
And grasses in the mead renew their birth,
The river to the river bed withdraws,
And altered is the fashion of the earth.

The Nymphs and Graces three put off their fear
And unapparelled in the woodland play.
The swift hour and the brief prime of the year
Say to the soul, Thou wast not born for aye.

Thaw follows frost; hard on the heel of spring
Treads summer sure to die, for hard on hers
Comes autumn with his apples scattering;
Then back to wintertide, when nothing stirs.

But oh, whate’er the sky-led seasons mar,
Moon upon moon rebuilds it with her beams;
Come we where Tullus and Ancus are
And good Aeneas, we are dust and dreams.

Torquatus, if the gods in heaven shall add
The morrow to the day, what tongue has told?
Feast then thy heart, for what thy heart has had
The fingers of no heir will ever hold.

When thou descendest once the shades among,
The stern assize and equal judgment o’er,
Not thy long lineage nor thy golden tongue,
No, nor thy righteousness, shall friend thee more.

Night holds Hippolytus the pure of stain,
Diana steads him nothing, he must stay;
And Theseus leaves Pirithous in the chain
The love of comrades cannot take away.

(A.E. Housman -- his translation of this ode of Horace first appeared in 1897;
I think that Housman called this poem, the poem below, the most beautiful poem in Latin literature)

Diffugere nives, redeunt iam gramina campis
arboribusque comae,
mutat terra vices et decrescentia ripas
flumina praetereunt,

Gratia cum Nymphis geminisque sororibus audet
ducere nuda choros.
immortalia ne speres, monet annus et almum
quae rapit hora diem.

frigora mitescunt zephyris, ver proterit aestas
interitura, simul
pomifer autumnus fruges effuderit, et mox
bruma recurrit iners.

damna tamen celeres reparant caelestia lunae;
nos ubi decidimus,
quo pius Aeneas, quo Tullus dives et Ancus,
pulvis et umbra sumus.

quis scit an adiciant hodiernae crastina summae
tempora di superi?
cuncta manus avidas fugient heredis, amico
quae dederis animo.

cum semel occideris et de te splendida Minos
fecerit arbitria,
non, Torquate, genus, non te facundia, non te
restituet pietas.

infernis neque enim tenebris Diana pudicum
liberat Hippolytum,
nec Lethaea valet Theseus abrumpere caro
vincula Pirithoo.

(written c. 15  B.C.E; the  Roman New Year,  which had begun on March 1, was changed to January 1 in 153 B.C.E., long, obviously, before Horace lived)