The Battle of Darkness and Light . Джон Мильтон

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СКАЧАТЬ That which his aspect had suppressed within it.

      This spark within me wholly re-enkindled

       My recognition of his altered face,

       And I recalled the features of Forese.

      "Ah, do not look at this dry leprosy,"

       Entreated he, "which doth my skin discolour,

       Nor at default of flesh that I may have;

      But tell me truth of thee, and who are those

       Two souls, that yonder make for thee an escort;

       Do not delay in speaking unto me."

      "That face of thine, which dead I once bewept,

       Gives me for weeping now no lesser grief,"

       I answered him, "beholding it so changed!

      But tell me, for God's sake, what thus denudes you?

       Make me not speak while I am marvelling,

       For ill speaks he who's full of other longings."

      And he to me: "From the eternal council

       Falls power into the water and the tree

       Behind us left, whereby I grow so thin.

      All of this people who lamenting sing,

       For following beyond measure appetite

       In hunger and thirst are here re-sanctified.

      Desire to eat and drink enkindles in us

       The scent that issues from the apple-tree,

       And from the spray that sprinkles o'er the verdure;

      And not a single time alone, this ground

       Encompassing, is refreshed our pain,—

       I say our pain, and ought to say our solace,—

      For the same wish doth lead us to the tree

       Which led the Christ rejoicing to say 'Eli,'

       When with his veins he liberated us."

      And I to him: "Forese, from that day

       When for a better life thou changedst worlds,

       Up to this time five years have not rolled round.

      If sooner were the power exhausted in thee

       Of sinning more, than thee the hour surprised

       Of that good sorrow which to God reweds us,

      How hast thou come up hitherward already?

       I thought to find thee down there underneath,

       Where time for time doth restitution make."

      And he to me: "Thus speedily has led me

       To drink of the sweet wormwood of these torments,

       My Nella with her overflowing tears;

      She with her prayers devout and with her sighs

       Has drawn me from the coast where one where one awaits,

       And from the other circles set me free.

      So much more dear and pleasing is to God

       My little widow, whom so much I loved,

       As in good works she is the more alone;

      For the Barbagia of Sardinia

       By far more modest in its women is

       Than the Barbagia I have left her in.

      O brother sweet, what wilt thou have me say?

       A future time is in my sight already,

       To which this hour will not be very old,

      When from the pulpit shall be interdicted

       To the unblushing womankind of Florence

       To go about displaying breast and paps.

      What savages were e'er, what Saracens,

       Who stood in need, to make them covered go,

       Of spiritual or other discipline?

      But if the shameless women were assured

       Of what swift Heaven prepares for them, already

       Wide open would they have their mouths to howl;

      For if my foresight here deceive me not,

       They shall be sad ere he has bearded cheeks

       Who now is hushed to sleep with lullaby.

      O brother, now no longer hide thee from me;

       See that not only I, but all these people

       Are gazing there, where thou dost veil the sun."

      Whence I to him: "If thou bring back to mind

       What thou with me hast been and I with thee,

       The present memory will be grievous still.

      Out of that life he turned me back who goes

       In front of me, two days agone when round

       The sister of him yonder showed herself,"

      And to the sun I pointed. "Through the deep

       Night of the truly dead has this one led me,

       With this true flesh, that follows after him.

      Thence his encouragements have led me up,

       Ascending and still circling round the mount

       That you doth straighten, whom the world made crooked.

      He says that he will bear me company,

       Till I shall be where Beatrice will be;

       There it behoves me to remain without him.

      This is Virgilius, who thus says to me,"

       And him I pointed at; "the other is

       That shade for whom just now shook every slope

      Your realm, that from itself discharges him."

      XXIV. СКАЧАТЬ