Classic Poem

Archytas, born to compass land and sea,
And of the countless sand thy charts to make,
A little boon of dust suffices thee,
Which on Matinian shores thy relicks take.
Nor is there profit in those airy dreams,
When you the houses of the planets try'd,
And the round world determin'd by your schemes,
Since in your death all these grand projects dy'd.
The sire of Pelops in like manner fell,
Tho' with the Gods he feasted in the sky;
Tithonus chang'd into a sauterelle,
And Minos in Jove's secrets wont to pry.
Death too has got Panthoides again,
Tho' having taken from the wall his shield,
He cou'd so well the Trojan times explain,
Nor ought to death but skin and nerves cou'd yield.
This was no mean professor in the ways
Of truth and nature, as you did presume —
But night, a gen'ral night, its wing displays,
And all at length must travel to the tomb.
The furies some expose to martial rage,
The greedy sailors perish in the wave,
The funerals increase of youth and age,
None from fell Proserpine themselves can save.
Me, e'en Archytas, the outrageous south,
Upon oblique Orion sure t'attend,
Where that ILLYRIC opes her gulphing mouth,
Involved at once in an unlook'd-for end.
But thou, O sailor, do not check thy hand,
Nor grutch on these unburied bones to throw
A little portion of the common sand —
So may the eastern blasts, whate'er you owe,
Whate'er they threaten to th'Hesperian floods,
(Thee safe) make Venusinian forrests pay,
And Jove and Neptune, with great store of goods,
Thee to Tarentum's port, in peace convey.
But shou'd you this benevolence neglect,
A fraud about to hurt your sons unborn,
Perchance, a due reward you may expect,
Of equal terror, and of equal scorn.
If not my prayers, my curses must prevail,
And no atonement can thy conscience clear,
'Tis not so much (tho' you're in haste to sail)
To sprinkle thrice the dust in kindness here.