James Vila Blake, Sonnets from Marcus Aurelius 8

8. 

Πορεύομαι διὰ τῶν κατὰ φύσιν, μέχρι πεσὼν ἀναπαύσομαι ἐναποπνεύσας μὲν τούτῳ, ἐξ οὖ καθ̓ ἡμέραν ἀναπνέω, πεσὼν δὲ ἐπὶ τούτῳ, ἐξ οὗ καὶ τὸ σπερμάτιον ὁ πατήρ μου συνέλεξε καὶ τὸ αἱμάτιον ἡ μήτηρ καὶ τὸ γαλάκτιον ἡ τροφός: ἐξ οὗ καθ̓ ἡμέραν τοσούτοις ἔτεσι βόσκομαι καὶ ἀρδεύομαι: ὃ φέρει με πατοῦντα καὶ εἰς τοσαῦτα ἀποχρώμενον αὐτῷ. 

I fare along, as indeed I must, through the things provided according to Nature, until at last I shall stop and rest, because I shall sink down. Then I shall breathe out my life into this same air from which every day I have inhaled my strength, and lay me down on this very earth from which my father collected the seed and my mother the blood and my nurse the milk for me, the same earth which day by day has afforded me meat and drink for so many years, and now bears me up as 1 tread it and use it to the full in so many ways. 

—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations 5.4  

8. 

My body and soul in this their singular time 

Of love, require a trysting place—the earth; 

And what a tryst! What pied and various clime— 

Sweet flower-bed nooks, to lone white-swaddled dearth! 

Thence did my childhood’s nurse obtain her milk, 

Heart-made enheartening food; thence eke the forms 

Were gleaned of linen, cotton, wool or silk 

For kirtles loose or snug i’ the sun or storms. 

Thence were my parents bred, and all my friends, 

And seemly feasts with them of corn and wine; 

And for my soul what harvest bright extends 

Of beauteous scenes, diversifying line! 

Glad will I march the earth while strength ’s to spare, 

Then glad expire in earth-befriending air.