1. A man who felt secure from fate is ignorant,
Seeking immortality like one striking with flint,

2. After the passage of time and its adversity,
And the changing of faces like the dawns.

3. An affliction befell them, as though
It had rubbed out their traces with an eraser.

4. Oh, would that I knew, when I am mourned as dead,
What my elegies will chant about me!

5. Will they say “Do not go far,
For many a hateful thing I dispelled through courage and generosity,

6. And alarming wars, feared if prolonged,
One day I repelled their arms with my arms,

7. And for many a kindled fire, with its fuel blazing,
I quenched the burning of their spears with my spears;

8. And a band of warriors I brought up to a band
And poured on the ill-omened the worst of mornings;

9. And whenever I set myself to split a boulder
I called out: ‘Help me once more to succeed!’

10. Do not go far! For every living being shall perish.
Inevitably bodies are corrupted, so be virtuous and succeed!”

11. A man who felt secure from fate is ignorant,
Seeking immortality like one striking with flint.

12. Indeed I took my due without contention
And I was generous with all without miserliness.

13. And I spent freely in winter what was rightfully mine,
At the departure of the winds.