Horacio it was one of the traditional great roman poets. A classic among classics, Virgilio's friend, and whose work was developed in perhaps the most glorious time of the empire. Today he died in Rome in the year 8 a. C. I remember her figure with 5 of his poems. His maxim, Carpe Diem, perfectly sums up reality and essence of human existence.
Horacio
Fifth Horacio Flaco was son of a freed slave and was able to study in Rome. He was welcomed by Gross, Caesar's killer, who named him military tribune of his army. But his unfitness for the position he returned him to Rome, where he began to work as notary, something that left him time to write verses. Then met Virgilio, which introduced him into the circle of Patron and he presented it to the emperor Augusto.
His work
Culture four genders:
- Satire, ironic portraits of his time divided into two books and written in hexameters;
- Epodes, 17 poems of varied themes and Hellenistic influence;
- Chamber (Carmina), also in hexameters;
- Epistles. Among these is the famous poetic art.
His poetry, especially for the perfection in form, is considered as the maximum literary expression of the virtues of his time.
5 poems
Carminum I, 11 - Carpe Diem
Do not pretend to know, it is not allowed,
the end that to me and you, Leucónoe,
the gods have assigned us,
or consult the Babylonian numbers.
It will be better to accept what comes,
whether there are many winters than Jupiter
grant you, or be this the last,
the one that now makes the Tyrrhenian Sea
break against opposite cliffs.
Don't be crazy, filter your wines
and adapts to the short space of your life
a long hope.
As we speak, envious time flees.
Live this day. Capture it.
Do not trust the uncertain tomorrow.
***
Carminum I, 30 - To venus
O Venus, queen of Gnidus and Paphos,
leave your dear Cyprus
and go to the ornate room
of Glícera, the one that invokes you
with numerous incense.
Come with you the fiery Child
and the Graces of low-cut sizes;
the Nymphs and the Youth come,
that without you nobody attracts;
Come on Mercury.
***
Carminum III, 25 - To Bacchus
Where, Bacchus, do you take me away, full of you?
To what forests, to what caverns
Am I swept away by a new mind?
In what den will I be heard
meditating introduce eternal glory
of the egregious Caesar in the stars and in the assembly
of Jupiter? I will sing the famous, the new,
what no mouth has sung.
No other than the insomniac Bacchante
she is stunned looking from the top of the Hebro,
Thrace white by snow
And the Rhodope trodden by barbarian foot:
so it pleases me, lost,
admire the riverbanks and the deserted forests.
O mighty lord of the Naiads
and of the Bacchantes capable of knocking down
the tall ash trees with your hands!
Nothing small, nor in a humble tone,
nothing mortal will celebrate. Sweet danger
It is, oh, Leneo, to follow the god that girdles your temples
with green branch.
***
Carminum I, 38 - To his slave
I hate, boy, Persian pomp.
I don't like those crowns
woven from linden leaves.
Stop chasing the place
where the late rose still blooms.
Solicitous, I try not to add anything
to the simple myrtle. Myrtle
it is good for you, that you serve me,
and me, what am I drinking
at the foot of the thin vine.
***
Carminum I, 23 - To Chloe
You avoid me, Chloe, like the fawn
that looks for deviant mountains
to his frightened mother, not without vain
fear of air and foliage.
If the hawthorn leaves flutter in the wind,
if the green lizards make them charge
life the brambles, feel fear,
his heart trembles, and his knees.
And yet I don't chase you
Like a fierce tiger or a Getullus lion,
to tear you to pieces. I only want
that you stop following your mother,
Well, you are old enough to follow your husband.