Epitaphius Bios

LAMENT FOR BION

Cry me a dirge, you glens and Dorian waters, and weep, you rivers, for lovely Bion. Now mourn for me, you plants, and now lament, you groves, now breathe forth your grief, you flowers, from clustered blossoms, now flush crimson in mourning, you roses, now you anemones, now, hyacinth, speak your letters, and more than ever cry "alas" upon your petals: a fair singer is dead.

Begin, Sicilian Muses, begin the lament.

Nightingales, you that grieve amid the thick leaves, to the Sicilian streams of Arethusa carry the tidings, that Bion is dead, the herdsman, and that with him the song too is dead, and the Dorian music has perished.

Begin, Sicilian Muses, begin the lament.

Strymonian swans, mourn your dirge beside the waters, and with grieving throats sing out a song of sorrow, such as old age sings upon your lips, and tell again the Oeagrian maidens, tell all the Bistonian Nymphs: Dorian Orpheus is dead.

Begin, Sicilian Muses, begin the lament.

That one, beloved of the herds, sings no more, no more sits beneath the lonely oaks and sings, but beside Pluto sings a song of Lethe. The mountains are voiceless, and the cows that stray to the bulls bellow and refuse to graze.

Begin, Sicilian Muses, begin the lament.

Your sudden death, Bion, Apollo himself wept, and the Satyrs mourned, and the black-cloaked Priapi; and the Pans groaned for your song, and through the woodland the Fountain-nymphs lamented, and their waters turned to tears. Echo too among the rocks laments, that now in silence she no longer imitates your lips. At your destruction the trees cast down their fruit, and all the flowers withered. From the sheep flowed no fair milk, no honey from the hives; it died in the wax for grief; for now there is no need to gather your honey, since your own honey is dead.

Begin, Sicilian Muses, begin the lament.

Not so much beside the sea-shores did the Siren mourn, nor ever so much sang the Nightingale among the crags, nor so much lamented along the long mountains the Swallow, nor so much for Halcyon's sorrows cried out Ceyx, nor so much among the grey waves sang the kerylos-bird, nor so much in the eastern glades over the son of Dawn, flying about his tomb, did the bird of Memnon wail, as much as they lamented for Bion now dead.

Begin, Sicilian Muses, begin the lament.

All the nightingales and swallows, whom once he delighted, whom he taught to speak, perching upon the branches opposite one another, kept wailing; and in answer cried the birds: "Mourn, you birds of sorrow; but so do we."

Begin, Sicilian Muses, begin the lament.

Who ever, thrice-longed-for one, shall make music on your pipe? Who shall set his mouth to your reeds? Who is so bold? For still your lips and your breath are breathing there, and the echo of your song still feeds among the reeds. Shall I carry the tune to Pan? Perhaps even he would dread to set his mouth to it, lest he come off second to you.

Begin, Sicilian Muses, begin the lament.

Galatea too weeps for your song, whom once you delighted as she sat beside you on the sea-shores. For not like the Cyclops did you make your music: from him she fled, the fair Galatea, but on you she gazed more sweetly than on the sea. And now, forgetful of the wave, upon the lonely sands she sits, and still she herds your cattle.

Begin, Sicilian Muses, begin the lament.

With you, oh herdsman, died all the gifts of the Muses, the lovely kisses of maidens, the lips of boys, and grieving about your body the Loves weep. And Cypris longs for you far more than for the kiss with which but yesterday she kissed the dying Adonis. This, oh most clear-voiced of rivers, is your second grief, this, Meles, is your new grief. Long ago Homer perished from you, that sweet mouth of Calliope, and they say you mourned your fair son with much-wept streams, and filled all the sea with your cry; now again another son you weep, and you melt away in a new sorrow. Both were beloved of springs: the one drank from the Pegasid fountain, the other had his draught of Arethusa. And the one sang of the fair daughter of Tyndareus and the great son of Thetis and Atreus' son Menelaus; but that other sang not of wars, not of tears, but Pan, and as a herdsman sang clear and sang as he tended the flock, and fashioned pipes and milked the gentle heifer, and taught the kisses of boys, and Love he nursed in his bosom and stirred up Aphrodite.

Begin, Sicilian Muses, begin the lament.

Every famous city laments you, Bion, all the towns. Ascra mourns you far more than Hesiod; the Boeotian woods do not so long for Pindar; not so much did lovely Lesbos grieve for Alcaeus; nor so much did the Teian town lament its singer; you Paros longs for more than Archilochus; and in Sappho's stead Mitylene still wails your music to this day. And to the Syracusans you are Theocritus; but I, I sing for you the song of Ausonian grief, no stranger to the bucolic song, but heir of that Dorian Muse which you taught your pupils, and honoring me with which to others you left your wealth, but to me you left your song.

Begin, Sicilian Muses, begin the lament.

Alas, the mallows, when they die down in the garden, and the green parsley, and the luxuriant curling anise, live again afterward and grow in another year; but we, the great and strong, the wise men, once we have first died, unhearing in the hollow earth sleep a very long, endless, unwakeable sleep. And you too shall lie wrapped in silence in the earth, but it has pleased the Nymphs that the frog should sing forever. Yet I would not envy them, for the song he sings is not fair.

Begin, Sicilian Muses, begin the lament.

Poison came, Bion, to your mouth, you tasted poison— to such lips did it come and was not made sweet? What mortal was so savage as to mix it for you, or to give the poison at your call?—the song escaped him.

Begin, Sicilian Muses, begin the lament.

But Justice overtakes all men. And I in this grief, shedding tears, lament your fate. If only I could, as Orpheus going down to Tartarus, as once Odysseus, as before them Heracles, I too would soon come to the house of Pluto, that I might see, and if to Pluto you make music, that I might hear what you sing. But come, for the Maiden sing some Sicilian strain and pipe some sweet bucolic song. She too was Sicilian, and on the Aetnaean shores she played, and she knows the Dorian melody; not unrewarded shall your singing be. And as before to Orpheus playing sweetly on the lyre she gave back his Eurydice, so you too, Bion, she will send to the mountains. And if I too could pipe in any way, beside Pluto I myself would sing.