I wish
I had nothing to do with this fifth generation,
Wish I had died before or been born after,
Because this is the Iron Age.
Not a day goes by
A man doesn’t have some kind of trouble.
Nights too, just wearing him down. I mean
The gods send us terrible pain and vexation.
Still, there’ll be some good mixed in with the evil,
And then Zeus will destroy this generation too,
Soon as they start being born grey around the temples.
Then fathers won’t get along with their kids anymore,
Nor guests with hosts, nor partner with partner,
And brothers won’t be friends, the way they used to be.
Nobody’ll honor their parents when they get old
But they’ll curse them and give them a hard time,
Godless rascals, and never think about paying them back
For all the trouble it was to raise them.
They’ll start taking justice into their own hands,
Sacking each other’s cities, no respect at all
For the man who keeps his oaths, the good man,
The just man. No, they’ll keep all their praise
For the wrongdoer, the man who is violence incarnate
And shame and justice will lie in their hands.
Some good-for-nothing will hurt a decent man
Slander him, and swear an oath on top of it.
Envy will be everybody’s constant companion,
With her foul mouth and hateful face, relishing evil.
And then
up to Olympos from the wide-pathed Earth,
lovely apparitions wrapped in white veils,
off to join the Immortals, abandoning humans
There go Shame and Nemesis. And horrible suffering
Will be left for mortal men, and no defense against evil.
~~Hesiod