Excerpt from Octavia and New Poems

The Emperor Nero having determined to rid himself of his wife, Octavia, has her banished to Pandataria, a dreary island wet with the blood of noble exiles, in the Mediterranean Sea. After having the Empress, though virtuous, accused of the vilest of crimes, he divorced her and openly celebrated his marriage to Poppaea.

Though stunned by this cruel accusation, which was worse than death, Octavia, still being only in her twentieth year, clings to life with the tenacity of youth. She feels her impending doom and writes a letter to Nero telling him she wishes just to live out her days in peace as his widow and sister, with no thought of returning to Rome.

Acte, a former freedwoman and mistress of Nero, visits Octavia in her exile and tells her ex-Empress that she has now embraced the Christian faith and repents her past.

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