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Ode 2.1 To Pollio, on his history of the civil wars

Of all the civil unrest since Metellus,　
the phases, causes and the crimes of war, 　
　of Fortune's games, of great men's grave
　　friendships, of weapons smeared with gore
not yet atoned for – you are writing now 　
a work whose every turn of phrasing rolls     　
　dangerous dice. Let not the ash 
　　deceive: you tread on blazing coals.  
Let your stern tragic muse not leave the stage    　　
for long. Once you've set the affairs of state　　
　in order, you will heed the theater's          　　
　　calling again. Pollio, the great
bastion of law to grieved defendants, famous    　　
for counseling the Senate council, crowned 　　
　with deathless military honor
　　by victory on Illyrian ground.　　
Even now I hear the war-horns' baleful roar　
in your raucous music, and the bugles' blare.　　
　I see the flash of swords, the fearful
　　horse and the horseman's face of fear. 
I see the great commanders soiled with dust 　
of war not unbecoming, and the whole　
　world fall at Rome's feet, notwithstanding
　　defiant Cato's dogged soul.
The gods allied with Africa who, helpless　
to help, left unavenged that country's shores, 　
　now sacrifice to dead Jugurtha　
　　the grandsons of his conquerors. 
What field grown fertile with the blood of Latins,  　
does not attest with graves the unholiest  　
　of wars, and how the Persians' ears
　　ring with the ruin of the West? 
What churning main, what river does not know　
those rueful wars' taste? What sea has the slaughter　
　of Rome's own sons not dyed? What beach
　　has our blood's gush not washed like water? 
Stop, sassy muse. Back to amusing musics,    　
from death-songs thrumming with Simonides,    　　
　 let's flee to one of Venus' grottos
　　to strum a lighter tune than these.  



Notes:

Stanza 1: 
Roman dates were customarily kept according to the names of the two consuls who took office in that year (though, in this case, only one is given.) Metellus Celer was consul in 60 BC, the year the general and politician Pompey along with Marcus Licinius Crassus and a rising politician by the name of Julius Caesar, struck up the informal political alliance normally referred to as the First Triumvirate. It ushered in a period of political deterioration that led to the end of the Roman Republic as a viable political entity. Horace here refers to the problems of rivalry and civil war between the participants in this alliance and those of the Second Triumvirate, which two decades later brought together Octavian (later to be the emperor named Augustus), Mark Antony and Marcus Aemilius Lepidus. 

Stanza 3:
Gaius Asinius Pollio (76 BC - 4 AD) served under Julius Caesar and then under Antony. In 40 BC he brought the embittered and estranged erstwhile partners of the Second Triumvirate, Antony and Octavian, together in the Treaty of Brundisium. In 39 BC he was honored with triumphal laurels for his victory over the Parthini in Illyria. The momentous work to which Horace refers here is Pollio's history of the political turmoil from 60 to 42 BC, which at the time was very fresh in people's minds and therefore, Horace would have us believe, dangerous to write about. 

Stanza 6:
Marcus Porcius Cato Uticensis (95– 46 BC), ruler of the North African city of Utica and great grandson of Cato the Censor, was a dogged defender of the republic who, after defeat at the battle of Thapsus, committed suicide rather than legitimate the Empire's dictatorship by accepting a pardon from Julius Caesar.

Stanza 7:
Allusion to the sack of the African city of Carthage in 146 BC. Jugurtha, king of Numidia, was defeated and executed in Rome in 104 BC. 

Stanza 10:
Simonides of Ceos, major Greek lyric poet of the 6th and 5th centuries BC, famed for his evocative elegies on fallen warriors. 

Trans. A.Z. Foreman

Mōtum ex Metellō cōnsule cīvicum　

bellīque causās et vitia et modōs　

　lūdumque Fōrtūnae gravisque

　　principum amīcitiās et arma

nōndum expiātīs uncta cruōribus,　　

perīculōsae plēnum opus āleae,　　

　tractās et incēdis per ignīs

　　suppositōs cinerī dolōsō.

Paulum sevērae Mūsa tragoediae　

dēsit theātrīs; mox, ubi pūblicās　

　rēs ōrdināris, grande mūnus

　　Cēcropiō repetēs cothurnō,

īnsigne maestīs praesidium reīs　

et cōnsulentī, Polliō, cūriae,　

　cui laurus aeternōs honōrēs

　　Delmaticō peperit triumphō.

Iam nunc minācī murmure cornuum

perstringis aurīs, iam lituī strepunt,　

　iam fulgor armōrum fugācis

　　terret equōs equitumque vultūs.

Vidēre magnōs iam videor ducēs　

nōn indecōrō pulvere sordidōs　

　et cūncta terrārum subacta

　　praeter atrōcem animum Catōnis.

Iūnō et deōrum quisquis amīcior　

Āfrīs inultā cesserat impotēns　

　tellūre, victōrum nepōtēs

　　rettulit īnferiās Iugurthae.

Quis nōn Latīnō sanguine pinguior　

campus sepulchrīs impia proelia　

　testātur audītumque Mēdīs

　　Hesperiae sonitum ruīnae?

Quī gurges aut quae flūmina lūgubris　

ignāra bellī? Quod mare Dauniae　

　nōn dēcolōrāvēre caedēs?

　　Quae caret ōra cruōre nostrō?

Sed nē relīctīs, Mūsa procāx, iocīs　

Cēae retractēs mūnera nēniae,　

　mēcum Diōnaeō sub antrō

　　quaere modōs leviōre plectrō.