Classic Poem

FROM THE INFERNO OF DANTE

CANTO V [ LINES 97 142]

‘The land where I was born sits by the seas,
Upon that shore to which the Po descends,
With all his followers, in search of peace.
Love, which the gentle heart soon apprehends,
Seized him for the fair person which was ta'en
From me, and me even yet the mode offends.
Love, who to none beloved to love again
Remits, seized me with wish to please, so strong,
That, as thou seest, yet, yet it doth remain.
Love to one death conducted us along,
But Caina waits for him our life who ended:’
These were the accents utter'd by her tongue.—
Since I first listen'd to these souls offended,
I bow'd my visage, and so kept it till—
‘What think'st thou’ said the bard; when I unbended,
And recommenced: ‘Alas! unto such ill
How many sweet thoughts, what strong ecstasies,
Led these their evil fortune to fulfil!’
And then I turn'd unto their side my eyes
And said, ‘Francesca, thy sad destinies
Have made me sorrow till the tears arise
But tell me, in the season of sweet sighs,
By what and how thy love to passion rose
So as his dim desires to recognise’
Then she to me: ‘The greatest of all won
Is to remind us of our happy days
In misery, and that thy teacher knows.
But if to learn our passion's first root preys
Upon thy spirit with such sympathy,
I will do even as he who weeps and says.
We read one day for pastime, seated nigh,
Of Lancilot, how love enchain'd him too.
We were alone, quite unsuspiciously.
But oft our eyes met, and our cheeks in hue
All o'er discolour'd by that reading were;
But one point only wholly us o'erthrew;
When we read the long-sigh'd-for smile of her,
To be thus kiss'd by such devoted lover,
He who from me can be divided ne'er
Kiss'd my mouth, trembling in the act all over.
Accursèd was the book and he who wrote!
That day no further leaf we did uncover.’—
While thus one spirit told us of their lot,
The other wept, so that with pity's thralls
I swoon'd as if by death I had been smote,
And fell down even as a dead body falls.