Twice Upon a Time

Saepius ad palmam Prasinus post fata Neronis pervenit et victor praemia plura refert. I nunc, livor edax, die te cessisse Neroni; vicit nimirum non Nero, sed Prasinus. Oftener after Nero’s death the green charioteer reaches the goal, And as winner bears off more prizes. Go to now, grudging envy, say you yielded to Nero. ’Twas not Nero, I wot, who won, but the Green.

Martial, Epigrams, Book 11, XXXIII
English translation by Walter C. A. Ker

Duane Michals, Dr. Heisenberg’s Magic Mirror of Uncertainty, 1998. Shot for French Vogue. Photo: Duane Michals/Courtesy DC Moore Gallery, New York.