AD CLARISS. VIRVM IOA- chimum Camerarium, Petri Lotichij Secundi. E L E G I A.

You ask, Joachimus, from where the words you read,

Composed in unevenly joined measures, bring greeting.

From here, where the Seine separates the Belgae from the borders

Of the Celts, to which the Marne joins its glassy waters.

And, bearing foam, it flows around the ancient city of the King,

And strikes its twin sides with a divided stream.

Perhaps you ask what the fortune of my affairs is:

And whether here, far away, I have leisure for the Muses, as before?

Doubtless, since this age favors the learned arts,

You urge me to love the deities of the Aonian fount.

Great was the reverence for the sacred poet in times past,

And the poem and the author were of equal value.

Now poems are read only if they are not harsh:

No honor is held for the author of the poem.

Yet I cannot dismiss my care for the Aonides:

Sooner would I begin to be unmindful of myself.

And no less do we investigate the causes of things, and the changes

Arising from the sun and the moon and the stars:

And by what art health may be restored,

And what root is helpful, and what herb is harmful.

But your image, whatever I do, always clings to me:

While I live, it will not depart from my breast.

Sooner will the undulating Ligeris and the Sarmatian Tyras

Glide backward within the same banks to their source.

I myself will drink all the juices from the whirlpool of Lethe:

I myself the sleep-inducing waters, if only they were given:

Yet they will not bring about any forgetting of you to me,

O sacred leader of the Aonian choir, Ioachimus.

Ever since I have been without you, having departed from that clime,

The year has already completed its journey once, the months fulfilled.

Yet whether the earth is hidden by its own shadow,

Or Phoebus revisits the ground with rosy light.

While now we survey the ancient ruins, lofty glories,

And whatever the plain holds on the riverbank's edge.

Or as we together lament broken loves,

Often remembering you, O herb-bearing Albis.

Meanwhile my voice names you at all hours,

To such a degree is the mention of your name pleasing.

There are also sweet friends who revere you,

By whose conversations I often lighten the hours.

Especially my compatriot Beutherus, who is likewise

Skilled at moving the plectrum of the Apollonian lyre:

Who now walks in the open plains of history,

And teaches how to assign everything to specific dates:

And retracing the spans of years from the origin of the world,

He takes a new path through unrolled ages.

Someone might say these things have often been published before: we confess it,

With him also following the distinct paths of the writers.

From which, reading himself what he considers appropriate,

Yet with everything laid out beforehand, he approves those.

Furthermore, what seemed inextricable to many,

He explains: and he has reasons to defend his view.

While he turns all these things over in his mindful breast, Titan

Already surveys his signs thrice with his swift steeds.

Meanwhile he has also traversed peoples and cities,

And set his wandering sails across the Santonic sea.

He has also added the numerous arts of speaking to the laws,

Wielding the weighty, imperious arms of the forum.

When, however, he rested from the greater care of affairs,

It was sweet to spend time in these studies.

Why should I mention how, while avoiding weariness,

He adorns his work with historical deeds, as if with diverse flowers?

You will recognize deeds unearthed from ancient volumes,

And many things which the Pierides have forbidden to die:

And whatever is memorable in this age, in peace or arms,

That Phoebus sees being done from either ocean.

Not differently through gardens cultivated in the genial spring

Is there not one appearance, not one color for the violets.

And with the black encircling the red, and the white encircling the saffron,

The garland woven from diverse roses is more beautiful.

I give you these learned monuments of my companion as a gift:

But you say to me, "Why do you not rather send your own?"

Often indeed I try to compose soft verses,

Yet not such that I would approve them for pure ears.

Let it be enough for me sometimes to beguile strict cares,

And I call the solace of my misfortune a great reward.

Yet we give these things in the meantime, so that you may know

That we are not on that account less mindful of you.

And would that by the clear waters of the slow-moving Ilurus,

Thus the poet's noble work might come to light:

In which he establishes the times of the rolling year marked in the calendar,

And the sacred rites and days in unequal measures:

By what rising the stars make the divisions of time,

And how they are carried downward beneath the western waters.

And what changes of things the son of Hyperion, traversing,

Governs the annual stars in twelve months.

But now grief drags his genius to contrary matters,

And with a complaining lyre he laments the public ruin.

Yet thus he also brings rest to biting cares,

And it is a pious sorrow to weep for the wounds of the fatherland.

He groans, the lofty rocks resound with mournful songs,

And the Ilm stops its gliding waters.

Perhaps even this worst winter of changed fortune

Will finally have an end after the clouds.

Then the Aonian Bards will break their deep silence,

Whose lyres now, Joachim, are silent out of fear.

And the Muse will resume the undertakings she previously abandoned in flight,

To go again through her accustomed paths.

But whatever the next hour will bring again, it must be borne:

I myself, however, shall be sustained by the hope of a better lot.

And constantly, never unmindful of your kindness,

I shall bear your sweet name in an unforgetting breast.

Do you also not lay aside the care for the absent one, and

Regard favorably, I pray, the duty of this gift.

And send again, Joachim, some work of your recent study,

Which we may read here with an eager mind.