TO HIS FELLOW-POETS AT ROME, UPON THE BIRTHDAY OF BACCHUS.
This is the day--blithe god of sack--which we, If I mistake not, consecrate to thee, When the soft rose we marry to the bays, And, warm'd with thy own wine, rehearse thy praise; 'Mongst whom--while to thy poet fate gave way-- I have been held no small part of the day. But now, dull'd with the cold Bear's frozen seat, Sarmatia holds me, and the warlike Gete. My former life, unlike to this my last, With Rome's best wits of thy full cup did taste, Who since have seen the savage Pontic band, And all the choler of the sea and land. Whether sad chance or Heav'n hath this design'd, And at my birth some fatal planet shin'd, Of right thou shouldst the sisters' knots undo, And free thy votary and poet too; Or are you gods--like us--in such a state As cannot alter the decrees of fate? I know with much ado thou didst obtain Thy jovial godhead, and on earth thy pain Was no whit less, for, wand'ring, thou didst run To the Getes too, and snow-weeping Strymon, With Persia, Ganges, and whatever streams The thirsty Moor drinks in the mid-day beams. But thou wert twice-born, and the Fates to thee --To make all sure--doubled thy misery. My sufferings too are many--if it be Held safe for me to boast adversity-- Nor was't a common blow, but from above, Like his that died for imitating Jove; Which, when thou heardst, a ruin so divine And mother-like should make thee pity mine, And on this day, which poets unto thee Crown with full bowls, ask what's become of me? Help, buxom god, then! so may thy lov'd vine Swarm with the num'rous grape, and big with wine Load the kind elm, and so thy orgies be With priests' loud shouts and satyrs' kept to thee! So may in death Lycurgus ne'er be blest, Nor Pentheus' wand'ring ghost find any rest! And so for ever bright--thy chief desires-- May thy wife's crown outshine the lesser fires! If but now, mindful of my love to thee, Thou wilt, in what thou canst, my helper be. You gods have commerce with yourselves; try then If Caesar will restore me Rome again. And you, my trusty friends--the jolly crew Of careless poets! when, without me, you Perform this day's glad myst'ries, let it be Your first appeal unto his deity, And let one of you--touch'd with my sad name-- Mixing his wine with tears, lay down the same, And--sighing--to the rest this thought commend, O! where is Ovid now, our banish'd friend? This do, if in your breasts I e'er deserv'd So large a share, nor spitefully reserv'd, Nor basely sold applause, or with a brow Condemning others, did myself allow. And may your happier wits grow loud with fame As you--my best of friends!--preserve my name.
[OVID, EPISTOLARUM] DE PONTO, LIB. III. [EPIST. VII.].