Poems by Ovid Ovid

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Metamorphoses: Book The Third

WHEN now Agenor had his daughter lost,

He sent his son to search on ev'ry coast;

And sternly bid him to his arms restore

The darling maid, or see his face no more,

But live an exile in a foreign clime;

Thus was the father pious to a crime.

The Story of The restless youth search'd all the world around;

of Cadmus But how can Jove in his amours be found?

Ovid Ovid

Metamorphoses: Book The Fifth

WHILE Perseus entertain'd with this report

His father Cepheus, and the list'ning court,

Within the palace walls was heard aloud

The roaring noise of some unruly crowd;

Not like the songs which chearful friends prepare

For nuptial days, but sounds that threaten'd war;

And all the pleasures of this happy feast,

To tumult turn'd, in wild disorder ceas'd:

Ovid Ovid

Metamorphoses: Book The Twelfth

PRIAM, to whom the story was unknown,

As dead, deplor'd his metamorphos'd son:

A cenotaph his name, and title kept,

And Hector round the tomb, with all his brothers,

wept.

This pious office Paris did not share;

Absent alone; and author of the war,

Which, for the Spartan queen, the Grecians drew

Ovid Ovid

Metamorphoses: Book The Second

THE Sun's bright palace, on high columns rais'd,

With burnish'd gold and flaming jewels blaz'd;

The folding gates diffus'd a silver light,

And with a milder gleam refresh'd the sight;

Of polish'd iv'ry was the cov'ring wrought:

The Story of The matter vied not with the sculptor's thought,

Phaeton For in the portal was display'd on high

(The work of Vulcan) a fictitious sky;

Ovid Ovid

Metamorphoses: Book The Ninth

Theseus requests the God to tell his woes,

Whence his maim'd brow, and whence his groans arose

Whence thus the Calydonian stream reply'd,

With twining reeds his careless tresses ty'd:

Ungrateful is the tale; for who can bear,

When conquer'd, to rehearse the shameful war?

Yet I'll the melancholy story trace;

So great a conqu'ror softens the disgrace:

Ovid Ovid

In Summer's Heat

In summer's heat and mid-time of the day,

To rest my limbs upon a bed I lay,

One window shut, the other open stood,

Which gave such light as twinkles in a wood

Like twilight glimpse at setting of the sun,

Or night being past and yet not day begun.

Such light to shamefaced maidens must be shown,

Where they may sport, and seem to be unknown.

Ovid Ovid

Metamorphoses: Book The Tenth

THENCE, in his saffron robe, for distant Thrace,

Hymen departs, thro' air's unmeasur'd space;

By Orpheus call'd, the nuptial Pow'r attends,

But with ill-omen'd augury descends;

Nor chearful look'd the God, nor prosp'rous spoke,

Nor blaz'd his torch, but wept in hissing smoke.

In vain they whirl it round, in vain they shake,

No rapid motion can its flames awake.

Ovid Ovid

Duplicity

Then must I always bear your endless accusations?

They all prove false, but still I have to fight them.

If I happen to glance at the marble theater's topmost row,

you pick some girl in the crowd to moan about;

or if a beautiful woman looks at me wordlessly,

you charge she's using lovers' wordless signs.

If I compliment a girl, you try to tear out my hair;

Ovid Ovid

Metamorphoses: Book The First

OF bodies chang'd to various forms, I sing:

Ye Gods, from whom these miracles did spring,

Inspire my numbers with coelestial heat;

'Till I my long laborious work compleat:

And add perpetual tenour to my rhimes,

Deduc'd from Nature's birth, to Caesar's times.

The Creation of Before the seas, and this terrestrial ball,

the World And Heav'n's high canopy, that covers all,

Ovid Ovid

Elegy V

In summer's heat and mid-time of the day

To rest my limbs upon a bed I lay,

One window shut, the other open stood,

Which gave such light, as twinkles in a wood,

Like twilight glimpse at setting of the sun,

Or night being past, and yet not day begun.

Such light to shamefast maidens must be shown,

Where they must sport, and seem to be unknown.

Ovid Ovid

Metamorphoses: Book The Eighth

NOW shone the morning star in bright array,

To vanquish night, and usher in the day:

The wind veers southward, and moist clouds arise,

That blot with shades the blue meridian skies.

Cephalus feels with joy the kindly gales,

His new allies unfurl the swelling sails;

Steady their course, they cleave the yielding main,

And, with a wish, th' intended harbour gain.

Ovid Ovid

Metamorphoses: Book The Fourth

YET still Alcithoe perverse remains,

And Bacchus still, and all his rites, disdains.

Too rash, and madly bold, she bids him prove

Himself a God, nor owns the son of Jove.

Her sisters too unanimous agree,

Faithful associates in impiety.

The Story of Be this a solemn feast, the priest had said;

Alcithoe and Be, with each mistress, unemploy'd each maid.

Ovid Ovid