What on earth did I do to deserve this fate ?
From my insouciance I awoke much too late.
'Tis to Tomi now in exile on the Black Sea
Augustus in his wisdom has condemned me.
Julia's company and that poem where I erred
Removed me from the leisured life I much preferred.
And now my sorry assize I needs must thole
With only my wife's tenderness me to console.
This crude and inclement clime I must now call home
Sequestered so far from my distant beloved Rome.
Surrounded I am by dull furs and guttural sounds
Where in my mind life with bright togas and verse abounds
If I am not to lose my precious muse
Their language I must learn and use.
Caesar hopes me to have metamorphosed
From sophisticate to rude yokel indisposed.
Yet my Epistulae ex Ponto plead for his mercy to contain
Hopes for my return to Rome, though that all looks in vain.
If my poetry cannot soften his implacable heart,
Then perhaps others will appreciate my art.
Enchained as I am in this Hades of a living tomb,
My poetry must transform it into my Elysium.
Where Rome was once my sucus et sanguis,
Tomi must now serve as my grand palace
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