Complete Poetical Works of Dante Gabriel Rossetti

by Dante Gabriel Rossetti

  All now is lost to me

  Which most was sweet in Love’s supremacy.

  So much of life is dead in its control,

  That she, my pleasant lady of all grace,?

  Is gone out of the devastated soul:

  I see her not, nor do I know her place;

  Nor even enough of virtue with me stays

  To understand, ah me!

  The flower of her exceeding purity. 10

  Because there comes - to kill that gentle thought

  With saying that I shall not see her more —

  This constant pain wherewith I am distraught,

  Which is a burning torment very sore,

  Wherein I know not whom I should implore. 15

  Thrice thank’d the Master be

  Who turns the grinding wheel of misery!

  Full of great anguish in a place of fear

  The spirit of my heart lies sorrowing,

  Through Fortune’s bitter craft. She lured it here, 20

  And gave it o’er to Death, and barb’d the sting;

  She wrought that hope which was a treacherous thing;

  In Time, which dies from me,

  She made me lose mine hour of ecstasy.

  For ye, perturb’d and fearful words of mine, 25

  Whither it like yourselves, even thither go;

  But always burthen’d with shame’s troublous sign,

  And on my lady’s name still calling low:

  For me, I must abide in such deep woe

  That all who look shall see 30

  Death’s shadow on my face assuredly.

  SONNET: OF HIS PAIN FROM A NEW LOVE

  Why from the danger did not mine eyes start, —

  Why not become even blind, - ere through my sight

  Within my soul thou ever couldst alight

  To say: ‘Dost thou not hear me in thy heart?’

  New torment then, the old torment’s counterpart, 5

  Fill’d me at once with such a sore affright,

  That, Lady, lady, (I said,) destroy not quite

  Mine eyes and me! O help us where thou art!

  Thou hast so left mine eyes, that Love is fain-

  Even Love himself - with pity uncontroll’d 10

  To bend above them, weeping for their loss:

  Saying: If any man feel heavy pain,

  This man’s more painful heart let him behold:

  Death has it in her hand, cut like a cross.

  (Death (la Morte), being feminine in Italian, is naturally personified as a female. I have endeavoured to bear this in mind throughout my translations, but possibly some instances might be found in which habit has prevailed, and I have made Death masculine.)

  GUIDO ORLANDI TO GUIDO CAVALCANTI

  PROLONGED SONNET: HE FINDS FAULT WITH THE CONCEITS OF THE FOREGOING SONNET

  Friend, well I know thou knowest well to bear

  Thy sword’s-point, that it pierce the close-lock’d mail:

  And like a bird to flit from perch to pale:

  And out of difficult ways to find the air:

  Largely to take and generously to share: 5

  Thrice to secure advantage: to regale

  Greatly the great, and over lands prevail.

  In all thou art, one only fault is there: -

  For still among the wise of wit thou say’st

  That Love himself doth weep for thine estate; 10

  And yet, no eyes no tears: lo now, thy whim!

  Soft, rather say: This is not held in haste;

  But bitter are the hours and passionate,

  To him that loves, and love is not for him.

  For me, (by usage strengthen’d to forbear 15

  From carnal love,) I fall not in such snare.

  GUIDO CAVALCANTI TO DANTE ALIGHIERI

  SONNET: HE REBUKES DANTE FOR HIS WAY OF LIFE, AFTER THE DEATH OF BEATRICE

  I come to thee by daytime constantly,

  But in thy thoughts too much of baseness find:

  Greatly it grieves me for thy gentle mind,

  And for thy many virtues gone from thee.

  It was thy wont to shun much company, 5

  Unto all sorry concourse ill inclined:

  And still thy speech of me, heartfelt and kind,

  Had made me treasure up thy poetry.

  But now I dare not, for thine abject life,

  Make manifest that I approve thy rhymes; 10

  Nor come I in such sort that thou may’st know.

  Ah! prythee read this sonnet many times:

  So shall that evil one who bred this strife

  Be thrust from thy dishonour’d soul and go.

  SONNET: OF AN ILL-FAVOURED LADY

  Just look, Manetto, at that wry-mouth’d minx;

  Merely take notice what a wretch it is;

  How well contrived in her deformities,

  How beastly favour’d when she scowls and blinks.

  Why, with a hood on (if one only thinks) 5

  Or muffle of prim veils and scapularies, -

  And set together, on a day like this,

  Some pretty lady with the odious sphinx; -

  Why, then thy sins could hardly have such weight,

  Nor thou be so subdued from Love’s attack, 10

  Nor so possess’d in Melancholy’s sway,

  But that perforce thy peril must be great

  Of laughing till the very heart-strings crack:

  Either thou’dst die, or thou must run away.

  BALLATA: CONCERNING A SHEPHERD-MAID

  Within a copse I met a shepherd-maid,

  More fair, I said, than any star to see.

  She came with waving tresses pale and bright,

  With rosy cheer, and loving eyes of flame,

  Guilding the lambs beneath her wand aright. 5

  Her naked feet still had the dews on them,

  As, singing like a lover, so she came;

  Joyful, and fashion’d for all ecstasy.

  I greeted her at once, and question made

  What escort had she through the woods in spring? 10

  But with soft accents she replied and said

  That she was all alone there, wandering;

  Moreover: ‘Do you know, when the birds sing,

  My heart’s desire is for a mate,’ said she.

  While she was telling me this wish of hers, 15

  The birds were all in song throughout the wood.

  ‘Even now then,’ said my thought, ‘the time recurs,

  With mine own longing to assuage her mood.’

  And so, in her sweet favour’s name, I sued

  That she would kiss there and embrace with me. 20

  She took my hand to her with amorous will,

  And answer’d that she gave me all her heart,

  And drew me where the leaf is fresh and still,

  Where spring the wood-flowers in the shade apart.

  And on that day, by Joy’s enchanted art, 25

  There Love in very presence seem’d to be.

  (The glossary to Barberino, already mentioned, refers to the existence, among the Strozzi MSS, of a poem by Lapo di Farinata degli Uberti, written in answer to the above ballata of Cavalcanti. As this respondent was no other than Guido’s brother-in-law, one feels curious to know what he said to the peccadilloes of his sister’s husband. But I fear the poem cannot yet have been published, as I have sought for it in vain at all my printed sources of information.)

  SONNET: TO A NEWLY ENRICHED MAN; REMINDING HIM OF THE WANTS OF THE POOR

  As thou wert loth to see, before thy feet,

  The dear broad coin roll all thy hill-slope down,

  Till, ‘twixt the cracks of the hard glebe, some clown

  Should find, rub oft, and scarcely render it; -

  Tell me, I charge thee, if by generous heat 5

  Or clutching frost the fruits of earth be grown,

  And by what wind the blight is o’er them strown,

  And with what gloom the
tempest is replete.

  Moreover (an’ it please thee,) when at morn

  Thou hear’st the voice of the poor husbandman, 10

  And those loud herds, his other family, -

  I feel quite sure that if Bettina’s born

  With a kind heart, she does the best she can

  To wheedle some of thy new wealth from thee.

  BALLATA: IN EXILE AT SARZANA

  Because I think not ever to return,

  Ballad, to Tuscany, -

  Go therefore thou for me

  Straight to my lady’s face,

  Who, of her noble grace, 5

  Shall show thee courtesy.

  Thou seekest her in charge of many sighs,

  Full of much grief and of exceeding fear.

  But have good heed thou come not to the eyes

  Of such as are sworn foes to gentle cheer: 10

  For, certes, if this thing should chance, - from her

  Thou then couldst only look

  For scorn, and such rebuke

  As needs must bring me pain; -

  Yea, after death again 15

  Tears and fresh agony.

  Surely thou knowest, Ballad, how that Death

  Assails me, till my life is almost sped:

  Thou knowest how my heart still travaileth

  Through the sore pangs which in my soul are bred: - 20

  My body being now so nearly dead,

  It cannot suffer more.

  Then, going, I implore

  That this my soul thou take

  (Nay, do so for my sake,) 25

  When my heart sets it free.

  Ah! Ballad, unto thy dear offices

  I do commend my soul, thus trembling;

  That thou may’st lead it, for pure piteousness,

  Even to that lady’s presence whom I sing. 30

  Ah! Ballad, say thou to her, sorrowing,

  Whereso thou meet her then:-

  ‘This thy poor handmaiden

  Is come, nor will be gone,

  Being parted now from one 35

  Who served Love painfully.’

  Thou also, thou bewilder’d voice and weak

  That goest forth in tears from my grieved heart,

  Shalt, with my soul and with this ballad, speak

  Of my dead mind, when thou dost hence depart, 40

  Unto that lady (piteous as thou art!)

  Who is so calm and bright

  It shall be deep delight

  To feel her presence there.

  And thou, Soul, worship her 45

  Still in her purity.

  CANZONE: A SONG OF FORTUNE

  Lo! I am she who makes the wheel to turn;

  Lo! I am she who gives and takes away;

  Blamed idly, day by day,

  In all mine acts by you, ye humankind.

  For whoso smites his visage and doth mourn, 5

  What time he renders back my gifts to me,

  Learns then that I decree

  No state which mine own arrows may not find.

  Who clomb must fall: - this bear ye well in mind,

  Nor say, because he fell, I did him wrong. 10

  Yet mine is a vain song:

  For truly ye may find out wisdom when

  King Arthur’s resting-place is found of men.

  Ye make great marvel and astonishment

  What time ye see the sluggard lifted up 15

  And the just man to drop,

  And ye complain on God and on my sway.

  O humankind, ye sin in your complaint:

  For He, that Lord who made the world to live,

  Lets me not take or give 20

  By mine own act, but as he wills I may.

  Yet is the mind of man so castaway,

  That it discerns not the supreme behest.

  Alas! ye wretchedest,

  And chide ye at God also? Shall not He 25

  Judge between good and evil righteously?

  Ah! had ye knowledge how God evermore,

  With agonies of soul and grievous heats,

  As on an anvil beats

  On them that in this earth hold high estate, - 30

  Ye would choose little rather than much store,

  And solitude than spacious palaces;

  Such is the sore disease

  Of anguish that on all their days doth wait.

  Behold if they be not unfortunate, 35

  When oft the father dares not trust the son!

  O wealth, with thee is won

  A worm to gnaw for ever on his soul

  Whose abject life is laid in thy control!

  If also ye take note what piteous death 40

  They ofttimes make, whose hoards were manifold,

  Who cities had and gold

  And multitudes of men beneath their hand;

  Then he among you that most angereth

  Shall bless me saying, ‘Lo! I worship thee 45

  That I was not as he

  Whose death is thus accurst throughout the land.’

  But now your living souls are held in band

  Of avarice, shutting you from the true light

  Which shows how sad and slight 50

  Are this world’s treasured riches and array

  That still change hands a hundred times a-day.

  For me, - could envy enter in my sphere,

  Which of all human taint is clean and quit, -

  I well might harbour it 55

  When I behold the peasant at his toil.

  Guiding his team, untroubled, free from fear,

  He leaves his perfect furrow as he goes,

  And gives his field repose

  From thorns and tares and weeds that vex the soil: 60

  Thereto he labours, and without turmoil

  Entrusts his work to God, content if so

  Such guerdon from it grow

  That in that year his family shall live:

  Nor care nor thought to other things will give. 65

  But now ye may no more have speech of me,

  For this mine office craves continual use:

  Ye therefore deeply muse

  Upon those things which ye have heard the while:

  Yea, and even yet remember heedfully 70

  How this my wheel a motion hath so fleet,

  That in an eyelid’s beat

  Him whom it raised it maketh low and vile.

  None was, nor is, nor shall be of such guile,

  Who could, or can, or shall, I say, at length 75

  Prevail against my strength.

  But still those men that are my questioners

  In bitter torment own their hearts perverse.

  Song, that wast made to carry high intent

  Dissembled in the garb of humbleness, - 80

  With fair and open face

  To Master Thomas let thy course be bent.

  Say that a great thing scarcely may be pent

  In little room: yet always pray that he

  Commend us, thee and me, 85

  To them that are more apt in lofty speech:

  For truly one must learn ere he can teach.

  (This and the three following Canzoni are only to be found in the later collections of Guido Cavalcanti’s poems. I have included them on account of their interest if really his, and especially for the beauty of the last among them; but must confess to some doubts of their authenticity.)

  CANZONE: A SONG AGAINST POVERTY

  O poverty, by thee the soul is wrapp’d

  With hate, with envy, dolefulness, and doubt.

  Even so be thou cast out,

  And even so he that speaks thee otherwise.

  I name thee now, because my mood is apt 5

  To curse thee, bride of every lost estate,

  Through whom are desolate

  On earth all honourable things and wise.

  Within thy power, each blessed condition dies:

  By thee, men’s minds with sore mistrust are made 10

  F
antastic and afraid: -

  Thou, hated worse than Death, by just accord,

  And with the loathing of all hearts abhorr’d.

  Yea, rightly art thou hated worse than Death,

  For he at length is long’d for in the breast. 15

  But not with thee, wild beast,

  Was ever aught found beautiful or good.

  For life is all that man can lose by death,

  Not fame, and the fair summits of applause;

  His glory shall not pause. 20

  But live in men’s perpetual gratitude.

  While he who on thy naked sill has stood,

  Though of great heart and worthy everso,

  He shall be counted low.

  Then let the man thou troublest never hope 25

  To spread his wings in any lofty scope.

  Hereby my mind is laden with a fear,

  And I will take some thought to shelter me.

  For this I plainly see: -

  Through thee, to fraud the honest man is led; 30

  To tyranny the just lord turneth here,

  And the magnanimous soul to avarice.

  Of every bitter vice

  Thou, to my thinking, art the fount and head.

  From thee no light in any wise is shed, 35

  Who bringest to the paths of dusky hell.

  I therefore see full well,

  That death, the dungeon, sickness, and old age,

  Weigh’d against thee, are blessed heritage.

  And what though many a goodly hypocrite, 40

  Lifting to thee his veritable prayer,

  Call God to witness there

  How this thy burden moved not Him to wrath.

  Why, who may call (of them that muse aright)

  Him poor, who of the whole can say,’Tis Mine? 45

  Methinks I well divine

  That want, to such, should seem an easy path.

  God, who made all things, all things had and hath;

  Nor any tongue may say that He was poor,

  What while He did endure 50

  For man’s best succour among men to dwell:

  Since to have all, with Him, was possible.

  Song, thou shalt wend upon thy journey now:

  And, if thou meet with folk who rail at thee,

  Saying that poverty 55

  Is not even sharper than thy words allow, -

  Unto such brawlers briefly answer thou,

  To tell them they are hypocrites; and then

  Say mildly, once again,

  That I, who am nearly in a beggar’s case, 60

  Might not presume to sing my proper praise.