Horace, Ode 9

Vides ut alta stet nive candidum...

See? The mountain's covered with snow.
The branches of the trees around our cabin
are tested by the weight of the sudden snowfall,
and the river's frozen in place, struck dumb by winter.

Oh commander of cocktails, melt our hearts!

Dump a stack of wood on the fire,

and on your way back, stop by the fridge and loose

da bomb, the chilled white wine‑in‑the‑box.

We must give up all this trying.
It's not for us to say when the wind will
stop having at the ocean. We couldn't break up the brawl
between the cypress and the ash if we tried.

And all the larger lessons still wait within:
tomorrow's not my call;  I profit not by fortune's progress
but by time's swirling;  if I miss out on the sweetest of all,
love, I might as well sit out the last dance.

I'm not at the very end of my rope.
I'm exactly in the middle of my earthly agony.
There are a thousand green fields I've yet to collapse in,
I've never been ashamed in some of the very greatest cities on earth.

Life will out— what's that sound? Her laughter
in the dark without me? She is betrayed by her abandonment
to a force not mine, but still she seems to hold off,
to promise me a bit of her love, if not its completion.