Since everyone is obviously too chicken to rise to Bobby's austere challenge of bad rhyme, and since, as he says, it's poetry month (I more than willingly take his word on that, in fact, if Bobby wanted to just declare this poetry month on his own initiative that would be dandy with me), I thought I'd post something most of you, maybe except for Ben (who seems to have read just about everything) -- not to be too excessively hypotactic about it, or unnecessarily delay the point with dubious grammar -- probably haven't read before.
I have broken the lines up into what I kind of figure were probably the original line breaks. Sorry, I'm too lazy to go over the Latin right now.
Okay, here goes:
To pleasant songs my work was erstwhile given,
and bright were all my labours then;
but now in tears to sad refrains am I compelled to turn.
Thus my maimed Muses guide my pen,
and gloomy songs make no feigned tears bedew my face.
Then could no fear so overcome
to leave me companionless upon my way.
They were the pride of my earlier bright-lived days:
in my later gloomy days they are the comfort of my fate;
for hastened by unhappiness has age come upon me without warning,
and grief hath set within me the old age of her gloom.
White hairs are scattered untimely on my head,
and the skin hangs loosely from my worn-out limbs.
Happy is that death which thrusts not itself
upon men in their pleasant years,
yet comes to them at the oft-repeated cry of their sorrow.
Sad is it how death turns away from the unhappy
with so deaf an ear, and will not close, cruel,
the eyes that weep. Ill is it to trust to
Fortune's fickle bounty, and while yet she smiled upon me,
the hour of gloom had well-nigh overwhelmed my head.
Now has the cloud put off its alluring face, wherefore
without scruple my life drags out its wearying delays.
Why, O my friends, did ye so often puff me up,
telling me that I was fortunate?
For he that is fallen low did never firmly stand.
First one to guess who that is gets, um, my congratulations. And no googling.
Posted by Alan Hogue at April 10, 2005 06:51 PMHere goes:
carmina qui quondam studio florente peregi,
flebilis heu maestos cogor inire modos.
ecce mihi lacerae dictant scribenda Camenae
et ueris elegi fletibus ora rigant.
has saltem nullus potuit peruincere terror,
ne nostrum comites prosequerentur iter.
gloria felicis olim uiridisque iuuentae,
solantur maesti nunc mea fata senis.
uenit enim properata malis inopina senectus
et dolor aetatem iussit inesse suam.
intempestiui funduntur uertice cani
et tremit effeto corpore laxa cutis.
mors hominum felix, quae se nec dulcibus annis
inserit et maestis saepe uocata uenit.
eheu, quam surda miseros auertitur aure
et flentes oculos claudere saeua negat!
dum leuibus male fida bonis fortuna faueret
paene caput tristis merserat hora meum;
nunc quia fallacem mutauit nubila uultum
protrahit ingratas impia uita moras.
quid me felicem totiens iactastis, amici?
qui cecidit, stabili non erat ille gradu...
Further clues: Think about Pilgrim's Progress, House of the Dead, De Profundis and the Pisan Cantos.
c/o Tom
Posted by: Tom Deveson at April 10, 2005 10:38 PMThat's lovely.
No guesses from me, though -- I've never read much poetry aside from Ogden Nash.
Posted by: Ben Brumfield at April 11, 2005 07:56 AMOK, another clue. The Latin was the original of Alan H's offering. Here's the start of a much earlier translation:
Allas! I wepynge, am constreyned to bygynnen vers of sorwful matere, that whilom in florysschyng studie made delitable ditees. For lo! rendynge Muses of poetes enditen to me thynges to ben writen, and drery vers of wretchidnesse weten my face with verray teres....
And so for 64 double-column pages.
How about if I mention that the translation above is Chaucer? No takers?
Posted by: Alan Hogue at April 13, 2005 08:40 AMOkay, well, the prize goes to Tom for obviously figuring out that it was Boethius, from the Consolation of Philosophy, written in the sixth century as the author was in prison awaiting execution.
Thanks for playing!
Posted by: Alan Hogue at April 14, 2005 04:53 PM