Classic Poem

In this wild vale where Cæsar bids thee sigh,
With bended, silvered head too early snowed,
Slowly each eve along the Ardiège road
Thou comest on the moss-grown rock to lie.

Thy youth, thy villa, greet again thine eye,
And Flamen red, as when with train he strode;
And so to ease thy longing's heavy load,
Sad Sabinula, thou regard'st the sky.

Toward seven-pointed Gar with splendors bright,
The tardy eagles hastening to their height
Bear on their wings the dreams that fill thy mind;

And so, without desire or hope, and lost to home,
Thou raisest altars to the Mountains kind,
Whose neighboring Gods now solace thee for Rome.