Boshonto Family

The Doctor’s Last Advice

Behold, there’s still your diet, to complete all the doctor’s duties,
I’ll give you what to swallow and avoid.
Italian onions, or the ones they send you, from the shores of Libya,
or the ones that come from Megara, every one will do you harm.
It’s no less fitting to avoid that lustful garden rocket,
and whatever readies these bodies of ours for making love.
Better to eat rue, which sharpens up the eyesight,
and whatever stops these bodies of ours from making love.
You ask what I teach about the gifts of Bacchus?
Expect to be enlightened, by my warnings, very briefly.
Wine prepares your heart for love, unless you take enough,
and your wits are stupefied, overcome by the neat juice.
By wind a fire is fed, by wind it is extinguished:
light breezes fan the flames, heavier gusts will kill them.
So don’t drink at all, or drink so much your cares all vanish:
if it’s anywhere between the two it’s bound to do you harm.
This work is done: hang garlands on my weary prow:
I’ve reached the port for which my course was set.
Soon you’ll say your holy prayers to the shrine of the poet,
men and women, healed by my song.