Tristia

                             1
It is because of exile I am here,
The utmost tip of the world, for old age
Brings one to the edge of what one lived among.
Before departure I was of that race
Which passed the time but thought of something else,
But now time fills the whole horizon:
Not what yesterday was or what tomorrow
Will bring, for what it brought is dead,
And what it will, will never come to life.
When will it pass? is all I have to ask.
No-one is implicated in that question
But I who now no longer live among
Even those who see me now as I do them.
But 'as' is not the word I should have used,
For age has given sight in its own blindness,
And no impression is conveyed to me
...