Mosella by Ausonius

2. The Hymn


Greetings! River praised for farmlands,
	Praised by farmers, for you brought
Here to them those walls of Trier
	Worthy of a Caesar’s court.



River path by the Moselle


Greetings! River flanked by hillsides
	Promising the scent of wine,
Flanked with banks of lushest grasses;
	Green your grass and green your vine.

Like the sea you carry shipping,
	River-like, your wavelets pass,
Like a brook you wind and shimmer,	
	Like a lake, your depths are glass.
		
No cool springs match you for drinking.
	Spring, brook, river, lake and sea 
Flowing back and forth to meet you -
	All they are, you too can be. 

As you slip, with placid waters,
	Nothing harms your even flow,
Neither breath of wind above you
	Nor deep-hidden rocks below;

Nor do boiling shallows rush you,
	And no island stands up high
To repel your waters from it,
	Challenging your majesty. 

Sailors travel downstream, using
	Oars to strike your moving tide;
Upstream, haul the mast with hawsers,
	Straining up the river-side.

As you watch your swirling eddies,
	You must think you go too slow.
On your bank no muddy sedges;
	Dry-foot to your edge we go.