Classic Poem

Scant offerings to the gods I paid and few
In lore of mad philosophy astray;
But now must put about and set anew
My sails, the course that late I left to lay.

For Jove, that wont through rift in murky cloud
To shoot his flashing levin from on high,
Drove forth his team of thunder-horses loud
And aery car athwart an azure sky.

Whereon the sluggish earth did quake with fear,
And all her wandering rivers at the sound,
And Styx withal, the loathed cavern drear
Of Taenarus, and Atlas' utmost bound.

God's power can change of high and low the plights,
That humbling, this uplifting; swooping down
With whirr of wings Fortune from one delights
To snatch, and on another set the crown.