Old vernal disorders unsettle the health
Of those who have time to be ill,
And in those who have not, the conscription of wealth
Strikes home with a glacial chill.
The rivers no longer are swollen in flood;
The ploughshare cuts crisp through the loam;
And our Legions, released from the merciless mud,
Less wistfully long to be home.
VIII
LEUCONOE, I warned you, in tranquil days of yore,
To curb your impious craving for Babylonian lore.
And now when earth is rocking, and war at fever heat,
More urgently than ever my warning I repeat.
Not that I seek to blame you, or others sore bested,
For longing to hold converse with your belovèd dead,
Or gain authentic tidings of how the heroes fare
Who never shall revisit the kindly upper air.
But whether in Plutonian abodes their spirits dwell,
Or haunt the happy meadows of radiant asphodel,
No messages, believe me, can truly heal or bless
Delivered by a hireling Thessalian sorceress.
If quick with dead may commune, if soul may speak to soul,
They need no base-born stranger to guide them to their goal,
No salaried enchantments, no workers of the wheel
That prompts the magic stylus to answer your appeal.
31
