Poetical Remains of the Late Mrs Hemans/To Delius

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For other versions of this work, see To Delius.

Book II. Ode III.

TO DELIUS.

Firm be thy soul!—serene in power,
    When adverse Fortune clouds the sky;
Undazzled by the triumph's hour,
    Since, Delius, thou must die!

Alike if still to grief resigned,
    Or if through festal days 'tis thine
To quaff, in grassy haunts reclined,
    The old Falernian wine:

Haunts where the silvery poplar-boughs
    Love with the pine's to blend on high,
And some clear fountain brightly flows
    In graceful windings by.

There be the rose, with beauty fraught
    So soon to fade, so brilliant now,

There be the wine, the odours brought,
    While Time and Fate allow!

For thou, resigning to thine heir,
    Thy halls, thy bowers, thy treasured store,
Must leave that home, those woodlands fair,
    On yellow Tyber's shore.

What then avails it if thou trace
    From Inachus thy glorious line?
Or, sprung from some ignoble race,
    If not a roof be thine?

Since the dread lot for all must leap
    Forth from the dark revolving urn,
And we must tempt the gloomy deep,
    Whence exiles ne'er return.

Original of the foregoing.

Æquam memento rebus in arduis
Servare mentem, non secus in bonis
    Ab insolenti temperatam
        Lætitia; moriture Delli,
Seu mœstus omni tempore vixeris,
Seu te in remoto gramine per dies
    Festos reclinatum beâris
        Interiore notâ Falerni.
Qua pinus ingens, albaque populus,
Umbram hospitalem consociare amant
    Ramis, et obliquo laborat
        Lympha fugax trepidare rivo;
Huc vina, et unguenta, et nimium brevis
Flores amœnos ferre jube rosæ,
    Dum res, et ætas, et sororum
Fila trium patiuntur atra.

Cedes coëmtis saltibus, et domo,
Villâque, flavus quam Tiberis lavit:
    Cedes; et exstructis in altum
        Divitiis potietur heres.
Divesne prisco natus ab Inacho,
Nil interest, an pauper et infimâ
    De gente, sub divo moreris,
        Victima nil miserantis Orci.
Omnes eodem cogimur: omnium
Versatur urnâ, serius, ocius
    Sors exitura, et nos in æternum
        Exsilium impositura cymbæ.