Bandusian fount of ice-cream soda!

The Stalling of Q. H. F.

Horace: Epode 14

_"Mollis inertia cur tantam diffuderit imis"_

Maecenas, you fret me, you worry me
Demanding I turn out a rhyme;
Insisting on reasons, you hurry me;
You want my iambics on time.
You say my ambition's diminishing;
You ask why my poem's not done.
The god it is keeps me from finishing
The stuff I've begun.

Be not so persistent, so clamorous.
Anacreon burned with a flame
Candescently, crescently amorous.
You rascal, you're doing the same!
Was no fairer the flame that burned Ilium.
Cheer up, you're a fortunate scamp,
... Consider avuncular William
And Phryne, the vamp.

On the Flight of Time

Horace: Book I, Ode 2

"_Tu ne quaesieris, scire nefas, quem mihi,
quem tibi_"

AD LEUCONOEN

Look not, Leuconoe, into the future;
Seek not to find what the Answer may be;
Let no Chaldean clairvoyant compute your
Time of existence.... It irritates me!

Better to bear what may happen soever
Patiently, playing it through like a sport,
Whether the end of your breathing is Never,
Or, as is likely, your time will be short.

This is the angle, the true situation;
Get me, I pray, for I'm putting you hep:
While I've been fooling with versification
Time has been flying.... Both gates!
Watch your step!

The Last Laugh

Horace: Epode 15

_"Nox erat et caelo fulgebat Luna sereno----"_

"How sweet the moonlight sleeps," I quoted,
"Upon this bank!" that starry night--
The night you vowed you'd be devoted--
I'll tell the world you held me tight.

The night you said until Orion
Should cease to whip the wintry sea,
Until the lamb should love the lion,
You would, you swore, be all for me.

Some day, Neaera, you'll be sorry.
No mollycoddle swain am I.
I shall not sit and pine, by gorry!
Because you're with some other guy!

No, I shall turn my predilection
Upon some truer, fairer Jane;
And all your prayer and genuflexion
For my return shall be in vain.

And as for _you_, who choose to sneer, O,
Though deals in lands and stocks you swing,
Though handsome as a movie hero,
Though wise you are--and everything;

Yet, when the loss of her you're mourning,
How I shall laugh at all your woe!
How I'll remind you of this warning,
And laugh, "Ha! ha! I told you so!"

Again Endorsing the Lady

Book II, Elegy 2

_"Liber eram et vacuo medit