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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/27179-h.zip b/27179-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..2c9bd7b --- /dev/null +++ b/27179-h.zip diff --git a/27179-h/27179-h.htm b/27179-h/27179-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9310cb2 --- /dev/null +++ b/27179-h/27179-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,1431 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of Laments, by Jan Kochanowski. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + p { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; + } + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; + } + + table {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} + + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + + .pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + /* visibility: hidden; */ + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; + } /* page numbers */ + + .linenum {position: absolute; top: auto; left: 4%;} /* poetry number */ + .blockquot{margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 10%;} + .sidenote {width: 20%; padding-bottom: .5em; padding-top: .5em; + padding-left: .5em; padding-right: .5em; margin-left: 1em; + float: right; clear: right; margin-top: 1em; + font-size: smaller; color: black; background: #eeeeee; border: dashed 1px;} + + .bb {border-bottom: solid 2px;} + .bl {border-left: solid 2px;} + .bt {border-top: solid 2px;} + .br {border-right: solid 2px;} + .bbox {border: solid 2px;} + + .center {text-align: center;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + .u {text-decoration: underline;} + + .caption {font-weight: bold;} + + .figcenter {margin: auto; text-align: center;} + + .figleft {float: left; clear: left; margin-left: 0; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: + 1em; margin-right: 1em; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .figright {float: right; clear: right; margin-left: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em; + margin-top: 1em; margin-right: 0; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .footnotes {border: dashed 1px;} + .footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} + .footnote .label {position: absolute; right: 84%; text-align: right;} + .fnanchor {vertical-align: super; font-size: .8em; text-decoration: none;} + + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem br {display: none;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem span.i0 {display: block; margin-left: 0em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i2 {display: block; margin-left: 2em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i4 {display: block; margin-left: 4em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Laments, by Jan Kochanowski + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Laments + +Author: Jan Kochanowski + +Translator: Dorothea Prall + +Release Date: November 6, 2008 [EBook #27179] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LAMENTS *** + + + + +Produced by Jimmy O'Regan (Produced from images generously +made available by Columbia University Libraries) + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<h1>Kochanowski</h1> + +<h1>Laments</h1> + +<!-- Autogenerated TOC. Modify or delete as required. --> +<p> +<a href="#INTRODUCTORY_NOTE"><b>INTRODUCTORY NOTE</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_I"><b>LAMENT I</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_II"><b>LAMENT II</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_III"><b>LAMENT III</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_IV"><b>LAMENT IV</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_V"><b>LAMENT V</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_VI"><b>LAMENT VI</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_VII"><b>LAMENT VII</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_VIII"><b>LAMENT VIII</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_IX"><b>LAMENT IX</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_X"><b>LAMENT X</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_XI"><b>LAMENT XI</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_XII"><b>LAMENT XII</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_XIII"><b>LAMENT XIII</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_XIV"><b>LAMENT XIV</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_XV"><b>LAMENT XV</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_XVI"><b>LAMENT XVI</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_XVII"><b>LAMENT XVII</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_XVIII"><b>LAMENT XVIII</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LAMENT_XIX"><b>LAMENT XIX</b></a><br /> +</p> +<!-- End Autogenerated TOC. --> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[1]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENTS" id="LAMENTS"></a>LAMENTS</h2> + +<h3>BY</h3> + + +<h2>JAN KOCHANOWSKI</h2> + + +<h3>VERSIFIED BY</h3> +<h3>DOROTHEA PRALL</h3> + + +<p>UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS<br /> +BERKELEY<br /> +1920</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[2]</a></span></p> +<p>UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SYLLABUS SERIES NO. 122</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[3]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="INTRODUCTORY_NOTE" id="INTRODUCTORY_NOTE"></a>INTRODUCTORY NOTE</h2> + +<p>Jan Kochanowski (1530-84) was the greatest poet of Poland +during its existence as an independent kingdom. His <i>Laments</i> are +his masterpiece, the choicest work of Polish lyric poetry before the +time of Mickiewicz.</p> + +<p>Kochanowski was a learned poet of the Renaissance, drawing his +inspiration from the literatures of Greece and Rome. He was also +a man of sincere piety, famous for his translation of the Psalms +into his native language. In his <i>Laments</i>, written in memory of +his little daughter Ursula, who died in 1579 at the age of thirty +months, he expresses the deepest personal emotion through the +medium of a literary style that had been developed by long years +of study. The <i>Laments</i>, to be sure, are not based on any classic +model and they contain few direct imitations of the classical poets, +though it may be noted that the concluding couplet of <i>Lament XV</i> +is translated from the <i>Greek Anthology</i>. On the other hand they are +interspersed with continual references to classic story; and, more +important, are filled with the atmosphere of the Stoic philosophy, +derived from Cicero and Seneca. And along with this austere +teaching there runs through them a warmer tone of Christian hope +and trust; <i>Lament XVIII</i> is in spirit a psalm. To us of today, +however, these poems appeal less by their formal perfection, by +their learning, or by their religious tone, than by their exquisite +humanity. Kochanowski's sincerity of grief, his fatherly love +for his baby girl, after more than three centuries have not lost their +power to touch our hearts. In the <i>Laments</i> Kochanowski embodied +a wholesome ideal of life such as animated the finest spirits of +Poland in the years of its greatest glory, a spirit both humanistic +and universally human.</p> + +<p style="text-align: right;">G. R. NOYES.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[5]</a></span></p> + +<p style="text-align: center;">TO URSULA KOCHANOWSKI</p> + +<p style="text-align: center;">A CHARMING, MERRY, GIFTED CHILD, WHO, AFTER SHOWING GREAT +PROMISE OF ALL MAIDENLY VIRTUES AND TALENTS, SUDDENLY, +PREMATURELY, IN HER UNRIPE YEARS, TO THE GREAT AND +UNBEARABLE GRIEF OF HER PARENTS, DEPARTED HENCE.</p> + +<p style="text-align: center;">WRITTEN WITH TEARS FOR HIS BELOVED LITTLE +GIRL BY JAN KOCHANOWSKI, HER HAPLESS FATHER.</p> + +<p style="text-align: center;">THOU ART NO MORE, MY URSULA.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span></p> +<p> +<i>Tales sunt hominum mentes, quali pater ipse<br /> +Juppiter auctiferas lustravit lumine terras.</i><br /> +</p> + +<h2><a name="LAMENT_I" id="LAMENT_I"></a>LAMENT I</h2> + +<p> +Come, Heraclitus and Simonides,<br /> +Come with your weeping and sad elegies:<br /> +Ye griefs and sorrows, come from all the lands<br /> +Wherein ye sigh and wail and wring your hands:<br /> +Gather ye here within my house today<br /> +And help me mourn my sweet, whom in her May<br /> +Ungodly Death hath ta'en to his estate,<br /> +Leaving me on a sudden desolate.<br /> +'Tis so a serpent glides on some shy nest<br /> +And, of the tiny nightingales possessed,<br /> +Doth glut its throat, though, frenzied with her fear,<br /> +The mother bird doth beat and twitter near<br /> +And strike the monster, till it turns and gapes<br /> +To swallow her, and she but just escapes.<br /> +"'Tis vain to weep," my friends perchance will say.<br /> +Dear God, is aught in life not vain, then? Nay,<br /> +Seek to lie soft, yet thorns will prickly be:<br /> +The life of man is naught but vanity.<br /> +Ah, which were better, then—to seek relief<br /> +In tears, or sternly strive to conquer grief?<br /> +</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENT_II" id="LAMENT_II"></a>LAMENT II</h2> + +<p> +If I had ever thought to write in praise<br /> +Of little children and their simple ways,<br /> +Far rather had I fashioned cradle verse<br /> +To rock to slumber, or the songs a nurse<br /> +Might croon above the baby on her breast.<br /> +Setting her charge's short-lived woes at rest.<br /> +For much more useful are such trifling tasks<br /> +Than that which sad misfortune this day asks:<br /> +To weep o'er thy deaf grave, dear maiden mine.<br /> +And wail the harshness of grim Proserpine.<br /> +But now I have no choice of subject: then<br /> +I shunned a theme scarce fitting riper men,<br /> +And now disaster drives me on by force<br /> +To songs unheeded by the great concourse<br /> +Of mortals. Verses that I would not sing<br /> +The living, to the dead I needs must bring.<br /> +Yet though I dry the marrow from my bones,<br /> +Weeping another's death, my grief atones<br /> +No whit. All forms of human doom<br /> +Arouse but transient thoughts of joy or gloom.<br /> +O law unjust, O grimmest of all maids,<br /> +Inexorable princess of the shades!<br /> +For, Ursula, thou hadst but tasted time<br /> +And art departed long before thy prime.<br /> +Thou hardly knewest that the sun was bright<br /> +Ere thou didst vanish to the halls of night.<br /> +I would thou hadst not lived that little breath—<br /> +What didst thou know, but only birth, then death?<br /> +And all the joy a loving child should bring<br /> +Her parents, is become their bitterest sting.<br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENT_III" id="LAMENT_III"></a>LAMENT III</h2> + +<p> +So, thou hast scorned me, my delight and heir;<br /> +Thy father's halls, then, were not broad and fair<br /> +Enough for thee to dwell here longer, sweet.<br /> +True, there was nothing, nothing in them meet<br /> +For thy swift-budding reason, that foretold<br /> +Virtues the future years would yet unfold.<br /> +Thy words, thy archness, every turn and bow—<br /> +How sick at heart without them am I now!<br /> +Nay, little comfort, never more shall I<br /> +Behold thee and thy darling drollery.<br /> +What may I do but only follow on<br /> +Along the path where earlier thou hast gone.<br /> +And at its end do thou, with all thy charms,<br /> +Cast round thy father's neck thy tender arms.<br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENT_IV" id="LAMENT_IV"></a>LAMENT IV</h2> + +<p> +Thou hast constrained mine eyes, unholy Death,<br /> +To watch my dear child breathe her dying breath:<br /> +To watch thee shake the fruit unripe and clinging<br /> +While fear and grief her parents' hearts were wringing.<br /> +Ah, never, never could my well-loved child<br /> +Have died and left her father reconciled:<br /> +Never but with a heart like heavy lead<br /> +Could I have watched her go, abandonèd.<br /> +And yet at no time could her death have brought<br /> +More cruel ache than now, nor bitterer thought;<br /> +For had God granted to her ample days<br /> +I might have walked with her down flowered ways<br /> +And left this life at last, content, descending<br /> +To realms of dark Persephone, the all-ending,<br /> +Without such grievous sorrow in my heart,<br /> +Of which earth holdeth not the counterpart.<br /> +I marvel not that Niobe, alone<br /> +Amid her dear, dead children, turned to stone.<br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENT_V" id="LAMENT_V"></a>LAMENT V</h2> + +<p> +Just as a little olive offshoot grows<br /> +Beneath its orchard elders' shady rows,<br /> +No budding leaf as yet, no branching limb,<br /> +Only a rod uprising, virgin-slim—<br /> +Then if the busy gardener, weeding out<br /> +Sharp thorns and nettles, cuts the little sprout,<br /> +It fades and, losing all its living hue,<br /> +Drops by the mother from whose roots it grew:<br /> +So was it with my Ursula, my dear;<br /> +A little space she grew beside us here,<br /> +Then Death came, breathing pestilence, and she<br /> +Fell, stricken lifeless, by her parent tree.<br /> +Persephone, Persephone, this flow<br /> +Of barren tears! How couldst thou will it so?<br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENT_VI" id="LAMENT_VI"></a>LAMENT VI</h2> + +<p> +Dear little Slavic Sappho, we had thought,<br /> +Hearing thy songs so sweetly, deftly wrought,<br /> +That thou shouldst have an heritage one day<br /> +Beyond thy father's lands: his lute to play.<br /> +For not an hour of daylight's joyous round<br /> +But thou didst fill it full of lovely sound,<br /> +Just as the nightingale doth scatter pleasure<br /> +Upon the dark, in glad unstinted measure.<br /> +Then Death came stalking near thee, timid thing,<br /> +And thou in sudden terror tookest wing.<br /> +Ah, that delight, it was not overlong<br /> +And I pay dear with sorrow for brief song.<br /> +Thou still wert singing when thou cam'st to die;<br /> +Kissing thy mother, thus thou saidst good-bye:<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">"My mother, I shall serve thee now no more</span><br /> +Nor sit about thy table's charming store;<br /> +I must lay down my keys to go from here,<br /> +To leave the mansion of my parents dear."<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">This and what sorrow now will let me tell</span><br /> +No longer, were my darling's last farewell.<br /> +Ah, strong her mother's heart, to feel the pain<br /> +Of those last words and not to burst in twain.<br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENT_VII" id="LAMENT_VII"></a>LAMENT VII</h2> + +<p> +Sad trinkets of my little daughter, dresses<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">That touched her like caresses,</span><br /> +Why do you draw my mournful eyes? To borrow<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">A newer weight of sorrow?</span><br /> +No longer will you clothe her form, to fold her<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Around, and wrap her, hold her.</span><br /> +A hard, unwaking sleep has overpowered<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Her limbs, and now the flowered</span><br /> +Cool muslin and the ribbon snoods are bootless,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">The gilded girdles fruitless.</span><br /> +My little girl, 'twas to a bed far other<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">That one day thy poor mother</span><br /> +Had thought to lead thee, and this simple dower<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Suits not the bridal hour;</span><br /> +A tiny shroud and gown of her own sewing<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">She gives thee at thy going.</span><br /> +Thy rather brings a clod of earth, a somber<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Pillow for thy last slumber.</span><br /> +And so a single casket, scant of measure,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Locks thee and all thy treasure.</span><br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENT_VIII" id="LAMENT_VIII"></a>LAMENT VIII</h2> + +<p> +Thou hast made all the house an empty thing,<br /> +Dear Ursula, by this thy vanishing.<br /> +Though we are here, 'tis yet a vacant place,<br /> +One little soul had filled so great a space.<br /> +For thou didst sing thy joyousness to all,<br /> +Running through every nook of house and hall.<br /> +Thou wouldst not have thy mother grieve, nor let<br /> +Thy father with too solemn thinking fret<br /> +His head, but thou must kiss them, daughter mine,<br /> +And all with that entrancing laugh of thine!<br /> +Now on the house has fallen a dumb blight:<br /> +Thou wilt not come with archness and delight,<br /> +But every corner lodges lurking grief<br /> +And all in vain the heart would seek relief.<br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENT_IX" id="LAMENT_IX"></a>LAMENT IX</h2> + +<p> +Thou shouldst be purchased, Wisdom, for much gold<br /> +If all they say of thee is truly told:<br /> +That thou canst root out from the mind the host<br /> +Of longings and canst change a man almost<br /> +Into an angel whom no grief can sap,<br /> +Who is not prone to fear nor evil hap.<br /> +Thou seest all things human as they are—<br /> +Trifles. Thou bearest in thy breast a star<br /> +Fixed and tranquil, and dost contemplate<br /> +Death unafraid, still calm, inviolate.<br /> +Of riches, one thing thou dost hold the measure:<br /> +Proportion to man's needs—not gold nor treasure;<br /> +Thy searching eyes have power to behold<br /> +The beggar housed beneath the roof of gold,<br /> +Nor dost thou grudge the poor man fame as blest<br /> +If he but hearken him to thy behest.<br /> +Oh, hapless, hapless man am I, who sought<br /> +If I might gain thy thresholds by much thought,<br /> +Cast down from thy last steps after so long,<br /> +But one amid the countless, hopeless throng!<br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENT_X" id="LAMENT_X"></a>LAMENT X</h2> + +<p> +My dear delight, my Ursula, and where<br /> +Art thou departed, to what land, what sphere?<br /> +High o'er the heavens wert thou borne, to stand<br /> +One little cherub midst the cherub band?<br /> +Or dost thou laugh in Paradise, or now<br /> +Upon the Islands of the Blest art thou?<br /> +Or in his ferry o'er the gloomy water<br /> +Does Charon bear thee onward, little daughter?<br /> +And having drunken of forgetfulness<br /> +Art thou unwitting of my sore distress?<br /> +Or, casting off thy human, maiden veil,<br /> +Art thou enfeathered in some nightingale?<br /> +Or in grim Purgatory must thou stay<br /> +Until some tiniest stain be washed away?<br /> +Or hast returned again to where thou wert<br /> +Ere thou wast born to bring me heavy hurt?<br /> +Where'er thou art, ah! pity, comfort me;<br /> +And if not in thine own entirety,<br /> +Yet come before mine eyes a moment's space<br /> +In some sweet dream that shadoweth thy grace.<br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENT_XI" id="LAMENT_XI"></a>LAMENT XI</h2> + +<p> +"Virtue is but a trifle!" Brutus said<br /> +In his defeat; nor was he cozenèd.<br /> +What man did his own goodness e'er advance<br /> +Or piety preserve from evil chance?<br /> +Some unknown foe confuses men's affairs;<br /> +For good and bad alike it nothing cares.<br /> +Where blows its breath, no man can flee away;<br /> +Both false and righteous it hath power to stay.<br /> +Yet still we vaunt us of our mighty mind<br /> +In idle arrogance among our kind;<br /> +And still we gaze on heaven and think we see<br /> +The Lord and his all-holy mystery.<br /> +Nay, human eyes are all too dull; light dreams<br /> +Amuse and cheat us with what only seems.<br /> +Ah, dost thou rob me, Grief, my safeguards spurning,<br /> +Of both my darling and my trust in learning?<br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENT_XII" id="LAMENT_XII"></a>LAMENT XII</h2> + +<p> +I think no father under any sky<br /> +More fondly loved a daughter than did I,<br /> +And scarcely ever has a child been born<br /> +Whose loss her parents could more justly mourn.<br /> +Unspoiled and neat, obedient at all times,<br /> +She seemed already versed in songs and rhymes,<br /> +And with a highborn courtesy and art,<br /> +Though but a babe, she played a maiden's part.<br /> +Discreet and modest, sociable and free<br /> +From jealous habits, docile, mannerly,<br /> +She never thought to taste her morning fare<br /> +Until she should have said her morning prayer;<br /> +She never went to sleep at night until<br /> +She had prayed God to save us all from ill.<br /> +She used to run to meet her father when<br /> +He came from any journey home again;<br /> +She loved to work and to anticipate<br /> +The servants of the house ere they could wait<br /> +Upon her parents. This she had begun<br /> +When thirty months their little course had run.<br /> +So many virtues and such active zeal<br /> +Her youth could not sustain; she fell from weal<br /> +Ere harvest. Little ear of wheat, thy prime<br /> +Was distant; 'tis before thy proper time<br /> +I sow thee once again in the sad earth,<br /> +Knowing I bury with thee hope and mirth.<br /> +For thou wilt not spring up when blossoms quicken<br /> +But leave mine eyes forever sorrow-stricken.<br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENT_XIII" id="LAMENT_XIII"></a>LAMENT XIII</h2> + +<p> +Ursula, winsome child, I would that I<br /> +Had never had thee if thou wert to die<br /> +So early. For with lasting grief I pay,<br /> +Now thou hast left me, for thy sweet, brief stay.<br /> +Thou didst delude me like a dream by night<br /> +That shines in golden fullness on the sight,<br /> +Then vanishes, and to the man awake<br /> +Leaves only of its treasures much heartbreak.<br /> +So hast thou done to me, belovèd cheat:<br /> +Thou madest with high hope my heart to beat<br /> +And then didst hurry off and bear with thee<br /> +All of the gladness thou once gavest me.<br /> +'Tis half my heart I lack through this thy taking<br /> +And what is left is good for naught but aching.<br /> +Stonecutters, set me up a carven stone<br /> +And let this sad inscription run thereon:<br /> +<i>Ursula Kochanowski lieth here,<br /> +Her father's sorrow and her father's dear;<br /> +For heedless Death hath acted here crisscross:<br /> +She should have mourned my death, not I her loss.</i><br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENT_XIV" id="LAMENT_XIV"></a>LAMENT XIV</h2> + +<p> +Where are those gates through which so long ago<br /> +Orpheus descended to the realms below<br /> +To seek his lost one? Little daughter, I<br /> +Would find that path and pass that ford whereby<br /> +The grim-faced boatman ferries pallid shades<br /> +And drives them forth to joyless cypress glades.<br /> +But do thou not desert me, lovely lute!<br /> +Be thou the furtherance of my mournful suit<br /> +Before dread Pluto, till he shall give ear<br /> +To our complaints and render up my dear.<br /> +To his dim dwelling all men must repair,<br /> +And so must she, her father's joy and heir;<br /> +But let him grant the fruit now scarce in flower<br /> +To fill and ripen till the harvest hour!<br /> +Yet if that god doth bear a heart within<br /> +So hard that one in grief can nothing win,<br /> +What can I but renounce this upper air<br /> +And lose my soul, but also lose my care.<br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENT_XV" id="LAMENT_XV"></a>LAMENT XV</h2> + +<p> +Golden-locked Erato, and thou, sweet lute,<br /> +The comfort of the sad and destitute,<br /> +Calm thou my sorrow, lest I too become<br /> +A marble pillar shedding through the dumb<br /> +But living stone my almost bloody tears,<br /> +A monument of grief for coming years.<br /> +For when we think of mankind's evil chance<br /> +Does not our private grief gain temperance?<br /> +Unhappy mother (if 'tis evil hap<br /> +We blame when caught in our own folly's trap)<br /> +Where are thy sons and daughters, seven each,<br /> +The joyful cause of thy too boastful speech?<br /> +I see their fourteen stones, and thou, alas,<br /> +Who from thy misery wouldst gladly pass<br /> +To death, dost kiss the tombs, O wretched one,<br /> +Where lies thy fruit so cruelly undone.<br /> +Thus blossoms fall where some keen sickle passes<br /> +And so, when rain doth level them, green grasses.<br /> +What hope canst thou yet harbor in thee? Why<br /> +Dost thou not drive thy sorrow hence and die?<br /> +And thy swift arrows, Phoebus, what do they?<br /> +And thine unerring bow, Diana? Slay<br /> +Her, ye avenging gods, if not in rage,<br /> +Then out of pity for her desolate age.<br /> +A punishment for pride before unknown<br /> +Hath fallen: Niobe is turned to stone,<br /> +And borne in whirlwind arms o'er seas and lands,<br /> +On Sipylus in deathless marble stands.<br /> +Yet from her living wounds a crystal fountain<br /> +Of tears flows through the rock and down the mountain,<br /> +Whence beast and bird may drink; but she, in chains,<br /> +Fixed in the path of all the winds remains.<br /> +This tomb holds naught, this woman hath no tomb:<br /> +To be both grave and body is her doom.<br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENT_XVI" id="LAMENT_XVI"></a>LAMENT XVI</h2> + +<p> +Misfortune hath constrainèd me<br /> +To leave the lute and poetry,<br /> +Nor can I from their easing borrow<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Sleep for my sorrow.</span><br /> +</p> + +<p> +Do I see true, or hath a dream<br /> +Flown forth from ivory gates to gleam<br /> +In phantom gold, before forsaking<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Its poor cheat, waking?</span><br /> +</p> + +<p> +Oh, mad, mistaken humankind,<br /> +'Tis easy triumph for the mind<br /> +While yet no ill adventure strikes us<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">And naught mislikes us.</span><br /> +</p> + +<p> +In plenty we praise poverty,<br /> +'Mid pleasures we hold grief to be<br /> +(And even death, ere it shall stifle<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Our breath) a trifle.</span><br /> +</p> + +<p> +But when the grudging spinner scants<br /> +Her thread and fate no surcease grants<br /> +From grief most deep and need most wearing,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Less calm our bearing.</span><br /> +</p> + +<p> +Ah, Tully, thou didst flee from Rome<br /> +With weeping, who didst say his home<br /> +The wise man found in any station,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">In any nation.</span><br /> +</p> + +<p> +And why dost mourn thy daughter so<br /> +When thou hast said the only woe<br /> +That man need dread is base dishonor?—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Why sorrow on her?</span><br /> +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span></p> +<p> +Death, thou hast said, can terrify<br /> +The godless man alone. Then why<br /> +So loth, the pay for boldness giving,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">To leave off living?</span><br /> +</p> + +<p> +Thy words, that have persuaded men,<br /> +Persuade not thee, angelic pen;<br /> +Disaster findeth thy defenses,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Like mine, pretenses.</span><br /> +</p> + +<p> +Soft stone is man: he takes the lines<br /> +That Fortune's cutting tool designs.<br /> +To press the wounds wherewith she graves us,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Racks us or saves us?</span><br /> +</p> + +<p> +Time, father of forgetfulness<br /> +So longed for now in my distress,<br /> +Since wisdom nor the saints can steel me,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Oh, do thou heal me!</span><br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENT_XVII" id="LAMENT_XVII"></a>LAMENT XVII</h2> + +<p> +God hath laid his hand on me:<br /> +He hath taken all my glee,<br /> +And my spirit's emptied cup<br /> +Soon must give its life-blood up.<br /> +</p> + +<p> +If the sun doth wake and rise,<br /> +If it sink in gilded skies,<br /> +All alike my heart doth ache,<br /> +Comfort it can never take.<br /> +</p> + +<p> +From my eyelids there do flow<br /> +Tears, and I must weep e'en so<br /> +Ever, ever. Lord of Light,<br /> +Who can hide him from thy sight!<br /> +</p> + +<p> +Though we shun the stormy sea,<br /> +Though from war's affray we flee,<br /> +Yet misfortune shows her face<br /> +Howsoe'er concealed our place.<br /> +</p> + +<p> +Mine a life so far from fame<br /> +Few there were could know my name;<br /> +Evil hap and jealousy<br /> +Had no way of harming me.<br /> +</p> + +<p> +But the Lord, who doth disdain<br /> +Flimsy safeguards raised by man,<br /> +Struck a blow more swift and sure<br /> +In that I was more secure.<br /> +</p> + +<p> +Poor philosophy, so late<br /> +Of its power wont to prate,<br /> +Showeth its incompetence<br /> +Now that joy proceedeth hence.<br /> +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span></p> +<p> +Sometimes still it strives to prove<br /> +Heavy care it can remove;<br /> +But its little weight doth fail<br /> +To raise sorrow in the scale.<br /> +</p> + +<p> +Idle is the foolish claim<br /> +Harm can have another name:<br /> +He who laughs when he is sad,<br /> +I should say was only mad.<br /> +</p> + +<p> +Him who tries to prove our tears<br /> +Trifles, I will lend mine ears;<br /> +But my sorrow he thereby<br /> +Doth not check, but magnify.<br /> +</p> + +<p> +Choice I have none, I must needs<br /> +Weep if all my spirit bleeds.<br /> +Calling it a graceless part<br /> +Only stabs anew my heart.<br /> +</p> + +<p> +All such medicine, dear Lord,<br /> +Is another, sharper sword.<br /> +Who my healing would insure<br /> +Will seek out a gentler cure.<br /> +</p> + +<p> +Let my tears prolong their flow.<br /> +Wisdom, I most truly know,<br /> +Hath no power to console:<br /> +Only God can make me whole.<br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENT_XVIII" id="LAMENT_XVIII"></a>LAMENT XVIII</h2> + +<p> +We are thy thankless children, gracious Lord.<br /> +The good thou dost afford<br /> +Lightly do we employ,<br /> +All careless of the one who giveth joy.<br /> +</p> + +<p> +We heed not him from whom delights do flow.<br /> +Until they fade and go<br /> +We take no thought to render<br /> +That gratitude we owe the bounteous sender.<br /> +</p> + +<p> +Yet keep us in thy care. Let not our pride<br /> +Cause thee, dear God, to hide<br /> +The glory of thy beauty:<br /> +Chasten us till we shall recall our duty.<br /> +</p> + +<p> +Yet punish us as with a father's hand.<br /> +We mites, cannot withstand<br /> +Thine anger; we are snow,<br /> +Thy wrath, the sun that melts us in its glow.<br /> +</p> + +<p> +Make us not perish thus, eternal God,<br /> +From thy too heavy rod.<br /> +Recall that thy disdain<br /> +Alone doth give thy children bitter pain.<br /> +</p> + +<p> +Yet I do know thy mercy doth abound<br /> +While yet the spheres turn round,<br /> +And thou wilt never cast<br /> +Without the man who humbles him at last.<br /> +</p> + +<p> +Though great and many my transgressions are,<br /> +Thy goodness greater far<br /> +Than mine iniquity:<br /> +Lord, manifest thy mercy unto me!<br /> +</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LAMENT_XIX" id="LAMENT_XIX"></a>LAMENT XIX</h2> + +<p style="text-align: center;"><span class="smcap">The Dream</span></p> + +<p> +Long through the night hours sorrow was my guest<br /> +And would not let my fainting body rest,<br /> +Till just ere dawn from out its slow dominions<br /> +Flew sleep to wrap me in its dear dusk pinions.<br /> +And then it was my mother did appear<br /> +Before mine eyes in vision doubly dear;<br /> +For in her arms she held my darling one,<br /> +My Ursula, just as she used to run<br /> +To me at dawn to say her morning prayer,<br /> +In her white nightgown, with her curling hair<br /> +Framing her rosy face, her eyes about<br /> +To laugh, like flowers only halfway out.<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">"Art thou still sorrowing, my son?" Thus spoke</span><br /> +My mother. Sighing bitterly, I woke,<br /> +Or seemed to wake, and heard her say once more:<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">"It is thy weeping brings me to this shore:</span><br /> +Thy lamentations, long uncomforted,<br /> +Have reached the hidden chambers of the dead,<br /> +Till I have come to grant thee some small grace<br /> +And let thee gaze upon thy daughter's face,<br /> +That it may calm thy heart in some degree<br /> +And check the grief that imperceptibly<br /> +Doth gnaw away thy health and leave thee sick,<br /> +Like fire that turns to ashes a dry wick.<br /> +Dost thou believe the dead have perished quite,<br /> +Their sun gone down in an eternal night?<br /> +Ah no, we have a being far more splendid<br /> +Now that our bodies' coarser claims are ended.<br /> +Though dust returns to dust, the spirit, given<br /> +A life eternal, must go back to heaven,<br /> +And little Ursula hath not gone out<br /> +Forever like a torch. Nay, cease thy doubt,<br /> +For I have brought her hither in the guise<br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span> +She used to wear before thy mortal eyes,<br /> +Though mid the deathless angels, brighter far<br /> +She shineth as the lovely morning star;<br /> +And still she offers up her prayers for you<br /> +As here on earth, when yet no words she knew.<br /> +If herefrom springs thy sorrow, that her years<br /> +Were broken off before all that endears<br /> +A life on earth to mortals she might prove—<br /> +Yet think how empty the delights that move<br /> +The minds of men, delights that must give place<br /> +At last to sorrow, as in thine own case.<br /> +Did then thy little girl such joy confer<br /> +That all the comfort thou didst find in her<br /> +Could parallel thine anguish of today?<br /> +Thou canst not answer otherwise than nay.<br /> +Then fret not that so early death has come<br /> +To what was dearest thee in Christendom.<br /> +She did not leave a land of much delight,<br /> +But one of toil and grief and evil blight<br /> +So plenteous, that all which men can hold<br /> +Of their so transitory blessings, gold,<br /> +Must lose its value through this base alloy,<br /> +This knowledge of the grief that follows joy.<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">"Why do we weep, great God? That with her dower</span><br /> +She bought herself no lord, that she might cower<br /> +Before upbraidings from her husband's kin?<br /> +That she knew not the pangs that usher in<br /> +The newborn child? And that she could not know,<br /> +Like her poor mother, if more racking woe<br /> +It were to bear or bury them? Ah, meet<br /> +Are such delights to make the world more sweet!<br /> +But heaven hath purer, surer happiness,<br /> +Free from all intermingling of distress.<br /> +Care rules not here and here we know not toil,<br /> +Misfortune and disaster do not spoil.<br /> +Here sickness can not enter nor old age,<br /> +And death, tear-nourished, hath no pasturage.<br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span> +We live a life of endless joy that brings<br /> +Good thoughts; we know the causes of all things.<br /> +The sun shines on forever here, its light<br /> +Unconquered by impenetrable night;<br /> +And the Creator in his majesty<br /> +Invisible to mortals, we may see.<br /> +Then turn thy meditations hither, towards<br /> +This changeless gladness and these rich rewards.<br /> +Thou know'st the world, what love of it can do:<br /> +Found thou thine efforts on a base more true.<br /> +Thy little girl hath chosen well her part,<br /> +Thou may'st believe, as one about to start<br /> +For the first time upon the stormy sea,<br /> +Beholding there great flux and jeopardy,<br /> +Returneth to the shore; while those that raise<br /> +Their sails, the wind or some blind crag betrays,<br /> +And this one dies from hunger, that from cold:<br /> +Scarce one escapes the perils manifold.<br /> +So she, who, though her years should have surpassed<br /> +That ancient Sybil, must have died at last,<br /> +Preferred that ending to anticipate<br /> +Before she knew the ills of man's estate.<br /> +For some are left without their parents' care,<br /> +To know how sore an orphan's lot to bear;<br /> +One girl must marry headlong, and then rue<br /> +Her dower given up to God knows who;<br /> +Some maids are seized by their own countrymen,<br /> +Others, made captive by the Tatar clan<br /> +And held thus in a pagan, shameful thrall,<br /> +Must drink their tears till death comes ending all.<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">"But this thy little child need fear no more,</span><br /> +Who, taken early up to heaven's door,<br /> +Could walk all glad and shining-pure within,<br /> +Her soul still innocent of earthly sin.<br /> +Doubt not, my son, that all is well with her,<br /> +And let not sorrow be thy conqueror.<br /> +Reason and self-command are precious still<br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span> +And yielding all to blighted hope is ill.<br /> +Be in this matter thine own lord, although<br /> +Thy longed-for happiness thou must forego.<br /> +For man is born exposed to circumstance,<br /> +To be the target of all evil chance,<br /> +And if we like it or we like it not<br /> +We still can not escape our destined lot.<br /> +Nor hath misfortune singled thee, my son;<br /> +It lays its burdens upon every one.<br /> +Thy little child was mortal as thou art,<br /> +She ran her given course and did depart;<br /> +And if that course was brief, yet who can say<br /> +That she would have been happier to stay?<br /> +The ways of God are past our finding out,<br /> +Yet what He holds as good shall we misdoubt?<br /> +And when the spirit leaves us, it is vain<br /> +To weep so long; it will not come again.<br /> +And herein man is hardly just to fate,<br /> +To bear in mind what is unfortunate<br /> +In life and to forget all that transpires<br /> +In full accordance with his own desires.<br /> +And such is Fortune's power, dearest son,<br /> +That we should not lament when she hath done<br /> +A bitter turn, but thank her in that she<br /> +Hath held her hand from greater injury.<br /> +So, yielding to the common order, bar<br /> +Thy heart to more disasters than now are;<br /> +Gaze at the happiness thou dost retain:<br /> +What is not loss, that must be rated gain.<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">"And finally, what profits the expense</span><br /> +Of thy long labor and the years gone hence,<br /> +While thou didst spend thyself upon thy books<br /> +And knewest scarce how lightsome pleasure looks?<br /> +Now from thy grafting pluck the fruit and save<br /> +Something of value from frail nature's grave.<br /> +To other men in sorrow thou hast shown<br /> +The comfort left them: hast none for thine own?<br /> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span> +Now, master, heal thyself: time is the cure<br /> +For all; but he whose wisdom doth abjure<br /> +The common ways, he should anticipate<br /> +The healing for which other men must wait.<br /> +What is time's cunning? That it drives away<br /> +Our former haps with newer ones, more gay,<br /> +Or like the old. So man by taking thought<br /> +Perceives them ere their accidents are wrought,<br /> +And by such thinking banishes the past<br /> +And views the future, quiet and steadfast.<br /> +Then bear man's portion like a man, my son,<br /> +The Lord of grief and comfort is but one."<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Then I awoke, and know not if to deem</span><br /> +This truth itself, or but a passing dream.<br /> +</p> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Laments, by Jan Kochanowski + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LAMENTS *** + +***** This file should be named 27179-h.htm or 27179-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/2/7/1/7/27179/ + +Produced by Jimmy O'Regan (Produced from images generously +made available by Columbia University Libraries) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Laments + +Author: Jan Kochanowski + +Translator: Dorothea Prall + +Release Date: November 6, 2008 [EBook #27179] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LAMENTS *** + + + + +Produced by Jimmy O'Regan (Produced from images generously +made available by Columbia University Libraries) + + + + + + + + + +LAMENTS + +BY + +JAN KOCHANOWSKI + + +VERSIFIED BY +DOROTHEA PRALL + + +UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS +BERKELEY +1920 + +UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SYLLABUS SERIES NO. 122 + + + + +INTRODUCTORY NOTE + +Jan Kochanowski (1530-84) was the greatest poet of Poland during its +existence as an independent kingdom. His _Laments_ are his masterpiece, +the choicest work of Polish lyric poetry before the time of Mickiewicz. + +Kochanowski was a learned poet of the Renaissance, drawing his +inspiration from the literatures of Greece and Rome. He was also a man +of sincere piety, famous for his translation of the Psalms into his +native language. In his _Laments_, written in memory of his little +daughter Ursula, who died in 1579 at the age of thirty months, he +expresses the deepest personal emotion through the medium of a literary +style that had been developed by long years of study. The _Laments_, to +be sure, are not based on any classic model and they contain few direct +imitations of the classical poets, though it may be noted that the +concluding couplet of _Lament XV_ is translated from the _Greek +Anthology_. On the other hand they are interspersed with continual +references to classic story; and, more important, are filled with the +atmosphere of the Stoic philosophy, derived from Cicero and Seneca. And +along with this austere teaching there runs through them a warmer tone +of Christian hope and trust; _Lament XVIII_ is in spirit a psalm. To us +of today, however, these poems appeal less by their formal perfection, +by their learning, or by their religious tone, than by their exquisite +humanity. Kochanowski's sincerity of grief, his fatherly love for his +baby girl, after more than three centuries have not lost their power to +touch our hearts. In the _Laments_ Kochanowski embodied a wholesome +ideal of life such as animated the finest spirits of Poland in the years +of its greatest glory, a spirit both humanistic and universally human. + +G. R. NOYES. + + +TO URSULA KOCHANOWSKI + +A CHARMING, MERRY, GIFTED CHILD, WHO, AFTER SHOWING GREAT PROMISE OF ALL +MAIDENLY VIRTUES AND TALENTS, SUDDENLY, PREMATURELY, IN HER UNRIPE +YEARS, TO THE GREAT AND UNBEARABLE GRIEF OF HER PARENTS, DEPARTED HENCE. + +WRITTEN WITH TEARS FOR HIS BELOVED LITTLE GIRL BY JAN KOCHANOWSKI, HER +HAPLESS FATHER. + +THOU ART NO MORE, MY URSULA. + +_Tales sunt hominum mentes, quali pater ipse +Juppiter auctiferas lustravit lumine terras._ + + + + +LAMENT I + +Come, Heraclitus and Simonides, +Come with your weeping and sad elegies: +Ye griefs and sorrows, come from all the lands +Wherein ye sigh and wail and wring your hands: +Gather ye here within my house today +And help me mourn my sweet, whom in her May +Ungodly Death hath ta'en to his estate, +Leaving me on a sudden desolate. +'Tis so a serpent glides on some shy nest +And, of the tiny nightingales possessed, +Doth glut its throat, though, frenzied with her fear, +The mother bird doth beat and twitter near +And strike the monster, till it turns and gapes +To swallow her, and she but just escapes. +"'Tis vain to weep," my friends perchance will say. +Dear God, is aught in life not vain, then? Nay, +Seek to lie soft, yet thorns will prickly be: +The life of man is naught but vanity. +Ah, which were better, then--to seek relief +In tears, or sternly strive to conquer grief? + + +LAMENT II + +If I had ever thought to write in praise +Of little children and their simple ways, +Far rather had I fashioned cradle verse +To rock to slumber, or the songs a nurse +Might croon above the baby on her breast. +Setting her charge's short-lived woes at rest. +For much more useful are such trifling tasks +Than that which sad misfortune this day asks: +To weep o'er thy deaf grave, dear maiden mine. +And wail the harshness of grim Proserpine. +But now I have no choice of subject: then +I shunned a theme scarce fitting riper men, +And now disaster drives me on by force +To songs unheeded by the great concourse +Of mortals. Verses that I would not sing +The living, to the dead I needs must bring. +Yet though I dry the marrow from my bones, +Weeping another's death, my grief atones +No whit. All forms of human doom +Arouse but transient thoughts of joy or gloom. +O law unjust, O grimmest of all maids, +Inexorable princess of the shades! +For, Ursula, thou hadst but tasted time +And art departed long before thy prime. +Thou hardly knewest that the sun was bright +Ere thou didst vanish to the halls of night. +I would thou hadst not lived that little breath-- +What didst thou know, but only birth, then death? +And all the joy a loving child should bring +Her parents, is become their bitterest sting. + + +LAMENT III + +So, thou hast scorned me, my delight and heir; +Thy father's halls, then, were not broad and fair +Enough for thee to dwell here longer, sweet. +True, there was nothing, nothing in them meet +For thy swift-budding reason, that foretold +Virtues the future years would yet unfold. +Thy words, thy archness, every turn and bow-- +How sick at heart without them am I now! +Nay, little comfort, never more shall I +Behold thee and thy darling drollery. +What may I do but only follow on +Along the path where earlier thou hast gone. +And at its end do thou, with all thy charms, +Cast round thy father's neck thy tender arms. + + +LAMENT IV + +Thou hast constrained mine eyes, unholy Death, +To watch my dear child breathe her dying breath: +To watch thee shake the fruit unripe and clinging +While fear and grief her parents' hearts were wringing. +Ah, never, never could my well-loved child +Have died and left her father reconciled: +Never but with a heart like heavy lead +Could I have watched her go, abandoned. +And yet at no time could her death have brought +More cruel ache than now, nor bitterer thought; +For had God granted to her ample days +I might have walked with her down flowered ways +And left this life at last, content, descending +To realms of dark Persephone, the all-ending, +Without such grievous sorrow in my heart, +Of which earth holdeth not the counterpart. +I marvel not that Niobe, alone +Amid her dear, dead children, turned to stone. + + +LAMENT V + +Just as a little olive offshoot grows +Beneath its orchard elders' shady rows, +No budding leaf as yet, no branching limb, +Only a rod uprising, virgin-slim-- +Then if the busy gardener, weeding out +Sharp thorns and nettles, cuts the little sprout, +It fades and, losing all its living hue, +Drops by the mother from whose roots it grew: +So was it with my Ursula, my dear; +A little space she grew beside us here, +Then Death came, breathing pestilence, and she +Fell, stricken lifeless, by her parent tree. +Persephone, Persephone, this flow +Of barren tears! How couldst thou will it so? + + +LAMENT VI + +Dear little Slavic Sappho, we had thought, +Hearing thy songs so sweetly, deftly wrought, +That thou shouldst have an heritage one day +Beyond thy father's lands: his lute to play. +For not an hour of daylight's joyous round +But thou didst fill it full of lovely sound, +Just as the nightingale doth scatter pleasure +Upon the dark, in glad unstinted measure. +Then Death came stalking near thee, timid thing, +And thou in sudden terror tookest wing. +Ah, that delight, it was not overlong +And I pay dear with sorrow for brief song. +Thou still wert singing when thou cam'st to die; +Kissing thy mother, thus thou saidst good-bye: + "My mother, I shall serve thee now no more +Nor sit about thy table's charming store; +I must lay down my keys to go from here, +To leave the mansion of my parents dear." + This and what sorrow now will let me tell +No longer, were my darling's last farewell. +Ah, strong her mother's heart, to feel the pain +Of those last words and not to burst in twain. + + +LAMENT VII + +Sad trinkets of my little daughter, dresses + That touched her like caresses, +Why do you draw my mournful eyes? To borrow + A newer weight of sorrow? +No longer will you clothe her form, to fold her + Around, and wrap her, hold her. +A hard, unwaking sleep has overpowered + Her limbs, and now the flowered +Cool muslin and the ribbon snoods are bootless, + The gilded girdles fruitless. +My little girl, 'twas to a bed far other + That one day thy poor mother +Had thought to lead thee, and this simple dower + Suits not the bridal hour; +A tiny shroud and gown of her own sewing + She gives thee at thy going. +Thy rather brings a clod of earth, a somber + Pillow for thy last slumber. +And so a single casket, scant of measure, + Locks thee and all thy treasure. + + +LAMENT VIII + +Thou hast made all the house an empty thing, +Dear Ursula, by this thy vanishing. +Though we are here, 'tis yet a vacant place, +One little soul had filled so great a space. +For thou didst sing thy joyousness to all, +Running through every nook of house and hall. +Thou wouldst not have thy mother grieve, nor let +Thy father with too solemn thinking fret +His head, but thou must kiss them, daughter mine, +And all with that entrancing laugh of thine! +Now on the house has fallen a dumb blight: +Thou wilt not come with archness and delight, +But every corner lodges lurking grief +And all in vain the heart would seek relief. + + +LAMENT IX + +Thou shouldst be purchased, Wisdom, for much gold +If all they say of thee is truly told: +That thou canst root out from the mind the host +Of longings and canst change a man almost +Into an angel whom no grief can sap, +Who is not prone to fear nor evil hap. +Thou seest all things human as they are-- +Trifles. Thou bearest in thy breast a star +Fixed and tranquil, and dost contemplate +Death unafraid, still calm, inviolate. +Of riches, one thing thou dost hold the measure: +Proportion to man's needs--not gold nor treasure; +Thy searching eyes have power to behold +The beggar housed beneath the roof of gold, +Nor dost thou grudge the poor man fame as blest +If he but hearken him to thy behest. +Oh, hapless, hapless man am I, who sought +If I might gain thy thresholds by much thought, +Cast down from thy last steps after so long, +But one amid the countless, hopeless throng! + + +LAMENT X + +My dear delight, my Ursula, and where +Art thou departed, to what land, what sphere? +High o'er the heavens wert thou borne, to stand +One little cherub midst the cherub band? +Or dost thou laugh in Paradise, or now +Upon the Islands of the Blest art thou? +Or in his ferry o'er the gloomy water +Does Charon bear thee onward, little daughter? +And having drunken of forgetfulness +Art thou unwitting of my sore distress? +Or, casting off thy human, maiden veil, +Art thou enfeathered in some nightingale? +Or in grim Purgatory must thou stay +Until some tiniest stain be washed away? +Or hast returned again to where thou wert +Ere thou wast born to bring me heavy hurt? +Where'er thou art, ah! pity, comfort me; +And if not in thine own entirety, +Yet come before mine eyes a moment's space +In some sweet dream that shadoweth thy grace. + + +LAMENT XI + +"Virtue is but a trifle!" Brutus said +In his defeat; nor was he cozened. +What man did his own goodness e'er advance +Or piety preserve from evil chance? +Some unknown foe confuses men's affairs; +For good and bad alike it nothing cares. +Where blows its breath, no man can flee away; +Both false and righteous it hath power to stay. +Yet still we vaunt us of our mighty mind +In idle arrogance among our kind; +And still we gaze on heaven and think we see +The Lord and his all-holy mystery. +Nay, human eyes are all too dull; light dreams +Amuse and cheat us with what only seems. +Ah, dost thou rob me, Grief, my safeguards spurning, +Of both my darling and my trust in learning? + + +LAMENT XII + +I think no father under any sky +More fondly loved a daughter than did I, +And scarcely ever has a child been born +Whose loss her parents could more justly mourn. +Unspoiled and neat, obedient at all times, +She seemed already versed in songs and rhymes, +And with a highborn courtesy and art, +Though but a babe, she played a maiden's part. +Discreet and modest, sociable and free +From jealous habits, docile, mannerly, +She never thought to taste her morning fare +Until she should have said her morning prayer; +She never went to sleep at night until +She had prayed God to save us all from ill. +She used to run to meet her father when +He came from any journey home again; +She loved to work and to anticipate +The servants of the house ere they could wait +Upon her parents. This she had begun +When thirty months their little course had run. +So many virtues and such active zeal +Her youth could not sustain; she fell from weal +Ere harvest. Little ear of wheat, thy prime +Was distant; 'tis before thy proper time +I sow thee once again in the sad earth, +Knowing I bury with thee hope and mirth. +For thou wilt not spring up when blossoms quicken +But leave mine eyes forever sorrow-stricken. + + +LAMENT XIII + +Ursula, winsome child, I would that I +Had never had thee if thou wert to die +So early. For with lasting grief I pay, +Now thou hast left me, for thy sweet, brief stay. +Thou didst delude me like a dream by night +That shines in golden fullness on the sight, +Then vanishes, and to the man awake +Leaves only of its treasures much heartbreak. +So hast thou done to me, beloved cheat: +Thou madest with high hope my heart to beat +And then didst hurry off and bear with thee +All of the gladness thou once gavest me. +'Tis half my heart I lack through this thy taking +And what is left is good for naught but aching. +Stonecutters, set me up a carven stone +And let this sad inscription run thereon: +_Ursula Kochanowski lieth here, +Her father's sorrow and her father's dear; +For heedless Death hath acted here crisscross: +She should have mourned my death, not I her loss._ + + +LAMENT XIV + +Where are those gates through which so long ago +Orpheus descended to the realms below +To seek his lost one? Little daughter, I +Would find that path and pass that ford whereby +The grim-faced boatman ferries pallid shades +And drives them forth to joyless cypress glades. +But do thou not desert me, lovely lute! +Be thou the furtherance of my mournful suit +Before dread Pluto, till he shall give ear +To our complaints and render up my dear. +To his dim dwelling all men must repair, +And so must she, her father's joy and heir; +But let him grant the fruit now scarce in flower +To fill and ripen till the harvest hour! +Yet if that god doth bear a heart within +So hard that one in grief can nothing win, +What can I but renounce this upper air +And lose my soul, but also lose my care. + + +LAMENT XV + +Golden-locked Erato, and thou, sweet lute, +The comfort of the sad and destitute, +Calm thou my sorrow, lest I too become +A marble pillar shedding through the dumb +But living stone my almost bloody tears, +A monument of grief for coming years. +For when we think of mankind's evil chance +Does not our private grief gain temperance? +Unhappy mother (if 'tis evil hap +We blame when caught in our own folly's trap) +Where are thy sons and daughters, seven each, +The joyful cause of thy too boastful speech? +I see their fourteen stones, and thou, alas, +Who from thy misery wouldst gladly pass +To death, dost kiss the tombs, O wretched one, +Where lies thy fruit so cruelly undone. +Thus blossoms fall where some keen sickle passes +And so, when rain doth level them, green grasses. +What hope canst thou yet harbor in thee? Why +Dost thou not drive thy sorrow hence and die? +And thy swift arrows, Phoebus, what do they? +And thine unerring bow, Diana? Slay +Her, ye avenging gods, if not in rage, +Then out of pity for her desolate age. +A punishment for pride before unknown +Hath fallen: Niobe is turned to stone, +And borne in whirlwind arms o'er seas and lands, +On Sipylus in deathless marble stands. +Yet from her living wounds a crystal fountain +Of tears flows through the rock and down the mountain, +Whence beast and bird may drink; but she, in chains, +Fixed in the path of all the winds remains. +This tomb holds naught, this woman hath no tomb: +To be both grave and body is her doom. + + +LAMENT XVI + +Misfortune hath constrained me +To leave the lute and poetry, +Nor can I from their easing borrow + Sleep for my sorrow. + +Do I see true, or hath a dream +Flown forth from ivory gates to gleam +In phantom gold, before forsaking + Its poor cheat, waking? + +Oh, mad, mistaken humankind, +'Tis easy triumph for the mind +While yet no ill adventure strikes us + And naught mislikes us. + +In plenty we praise poverty, +'Mid pleasures we hold grief to be +(And even death, ere it shall stifle + Our breath) a trifle. + +But when the grudging spinner scants +Her thread and fate no surcease grants +From grief most deep and need most wearing, + Less calm our bearing. + +Ah, Tully, thou didst flee from Rome +With weeping, who didst say his home +The wise man found in any station, + In any nation. + +And why dost mourn thy daughter so +When thou hast said the only woe +That man need dread is base dishonor?-- + Why sorrow on her? + +Death, thou hast said, can terrify +The godless man alone. Then why +So loth, the pay for boldness giving, + To leave off living? + +Thy words, that have persuaded men, +Persuade not thee, angelic pen; +Disaster findeth thy defenses, + Like mine, pretenses. + +Soft stone is man: he takes the lines +That Fortune's cutting tool designs. +To press the wounds wherewith she graves us, + Racks us or saves us? + +Time, father of forgetfulness +So longed for now in my distress, +Since wisdom nor the saints can steel me, + Oh, do thou heal me! + + +LAMENT XVII + +God hath laid his hand on me: +He hath taken all my glee, +And my spirit's emptied cup +Soon must give its life-blood up. + +If the sun doth wake and rise, +If it sink in gilded skies, +All alike my heart doth ache, +Comfort it can never take. + +From my eyelids there do flow +Tears, and I must weep e'en so +Ever, ever. Lord of Light, +Who can hide him from thy sight! + +Though we shun the stormy sea, +Though from war's affray we flee, +Yet misfortune shows her face +Howsoe'er concealed our place. + +Mine a life so far from fame +Few there were could know my name; +Evil hap and jealousy +Had no way of harming me. + +But the Lord, who doth disdain +Flimsy safeguards raised by man, +Struck a blow more swift and sure +In that I was more secure. + +Poor philosophy, so late +Of its power wont to prate, +Showeth its incompetence +Now that joy proceedeth hence. + +Sometimes still it strives to prove +Heavy care it can remove; +But its little weight doth fail +To raise sorrow in the scale. + +Idle is the foolish claim +Harm can have another name: +He who laughs when he is sad, +I should say was only mad. + +Him who tries to prove our tears +Trifles, I will lend mine ears; +But my sorrow he thereby +Doth not check, but magnify. + +Choice I have none, I must needs +Weep if all my spirit bleeds. +Calling it a graceless part +Only stabs anew my heart. + +All such medicine, dear Lord, +Is another, sharper sword. +Who my healing would insure +Will seek out a gentler cure. + +Let my tears prolong their flow. +Wisdom, I most truly know, +Hath no power to console: +Only God can make me whole. + + +LAMENT XVIII + +We are thy thankless children, gracious Lord. +The good thou dost afford +Lightly do we employ, +All careless of the one who giveth joy. + +We heed not him from whom delights do flow. +Until they fade and go +We take no thought to render +That gratitude we owe the bounteous sender. + +Yet keep us in thy care. Let not our pride +Cause thee, dear God, to hide +The glory of thy beauty: +Chasten us till we shall recall our duty. + +Yet punish us as with a father's hand. +We mites, cannot withstand +Thine anger; we are snow, +Thy wrath, the sun that melts us in its glow. + +Make us not perish thus, eternal God, +From thy too heavy rod. +Recall that thy disdain +Alone doth give thy children bitter pain. + +Yet I do know thy mercy doth abound +While yet the spheres turn round, +And thou wilt never cast +Without the man who humbles him at last. + +Though great and many my transgressions are, +Thy goodness greater far +Than mine iniquity: +Lord, manifest thy mercy unto me! + + +LAMENT XIX + +The Dream + +Long through the night hours sorrow was my guest +And would not let my fainting body rest, +Till just ere dawn from out its slow dominions +Flew sleep to wrap me in its dear dusk pinions. +And then it was my mother did appear +Before mine eyes in vision doubly dear; +For in her arms she held my darling one, +My Ursula, just as she used to run +To me at dawn to say her morning prayer, +In her white nightgown, with her curling hair +Framing her rosy face, her eyes about +To laugh, like flowers only halfway out. + "Art thou still sorrowing, my son?" Thus spoke +My mother. Sighing bitterly, I woke, +Or seemed to wake, and heard her say once more: + "It is thy weeping brings me to this shore: +Thy lamentations, long uncomforted, +Have reached the hidden chambers of the dead, +Till I have come to grant thee some small grace +And let thee gaze upon thy daughter's face, +That it may calm thy heart in some degree +And check the grief that imperceptibly +Doth gnaw away thy health and leave thee sick, +Like fire that turns to ashes a dry wick. +Dost thou believe the dead have perished quite, +Their sun gone down in an eternal night? +Ah no, we have a being far more splendid +Now that our bodies' coarser claims are ended. +Though dust returns to dust, the spirit, given +A life eternal, must go back to heaven, +And little Ursula hath not gone out +Forever like a torch. Nay, cease thy doubt, +For I have brought her hither in the guise +She used to wear before thy mortal eyes, +Though mid the deathless angels, brighter far +She shineth as the lovely morning star; +And still she offers up her prayers for you +As here on earth, when yet no words she knew. +If herefrom springs thy sorrow, that her years +Were broken off before all that endears +A life on earth to mortals she might prove-- +Yet think how empty the delights that move +The minds of men, delights that must give place +At last to sorrow, as in thine own case. +Did then thy little girl such joy confer +That all the comfort thou didst find in her +Could parallel thine anguish of today? +Thou canst not answer otherwise than nay. +Then fret not that so early death has come +To what was dearest thee in Christendom. +She did not leave a land of much delight, +But one of toil and grief and evil blight +So plenteous, that all which men can hold +Of their so transitory blessings, gold, +Must lose its value through this base alloy, +This knowledge of the grief that follows joy. + "Why do we weep, great God? That with her dower +She bought herself no lord, that she might cower +Before upbraidings from her husband's kin? +That she knew not the pangs that usher in +The newborn child? And that she could not know, +Like her poor mother, if more racking woe +It were to bear or bury them? Ah, meet +Are such delights to make the world more sweet! +But heaven hath purer, surer happiness, +Free from all intermingling of distress. +Care rules not here and here we know not toil, +Misfortune and disaster do not spoil. +Here sickness can not enter nor old age, +And death, tear-nourished, hath no pasturage. +We live a life of endless joy that brings +Good thoughts; we know the causes of all things. +The sun shines on forever here, its light +Unconquered by impenetrable night; +And the Creator in his majesty +Invisible to mortals, we may see. +Then turn thy meditations hither, towards +This changeless gladness and these rich rewards. +Thou know'st the world, what love of it can do: +Found thou thine efforts on a base more true. +Thy little girl hath chosen well her part, +Thou may'st believe, as one about to start +For the first time upon the stormy sea, +Beholding there great flux and jeopardy, +Returneth to the shore; while those that raise +Their sails, the wind or some blind crag betrays, +And this one dies from hunger, that from cold: +Scarce one escapes the perils manifold. +So she, who, though her years should have surpassed +That ancient Sybil, must have died at last, +Preferred that ending to anticipate +Before she knew the ills of man's estate. +For some are left without their parents' care, +To know how sore an orphan's lot to bear; +One girl must marry headlong, and then rue +Her dower given up to God knows who; +Some maids are seized by their own countrymen, +Others, made captive by the Tatar clan +And held thus in a pagan, shameful thrall, +Must drink their tears till death comes ending all. + "But this thy little child need fear no more, +Who, taken early up to heaven's door, +Could walk all glad and shining-pure within, +Her soul still innocent of earthly sin. +Doubt not, my son, that all is well with her, +And let not sorrow be thy conqueror. +Reason and self-command are precious still +And yielding all to blighted hope is ill. +Be in this matter thine own lord, although +Thy longed-for happiness thou must forego. +For man is born exposed to circumstance, +To be the target of all evil chance, +And if we like it or we like it not +We still can not escape our destined lot. +Nor hath misfortune singled thee, my son; +It lays its burdens upon every one. +Thy little child was mortal as thou art, +She ran her given course and did depart; +And if that course was brief, yet who can say +That she would have been happier to stay? +The ways of God are past our finding out, +Yet what He holds as good shall we misdoubt? +And when the spirit leaves us, it is vain +To weep so long; it will not come again. +And herein man is hardly just to fate, +To bear in mind what is unfortunate +In life and to forget all that transpires +In full accordance with his own desires. +And such is Fortune's power, dearest son, +That we should not lament when she hath done +A bitter turn, but thank her in that she +Hath held her hand from greater injury. +So, yielding to the common order, bar +Thy heart to more disasters than now are; +Gaze at the happiness thou dost retain: +What is not loss, that must be rated gain. + "And finally, what profits the expense +Of thy long labor and the years gone hence, +While thou didst spend thyself upon thy books +And knewest scarce how lightsome pleasure looks? +Now from thy grafting pluck the fruit and save +Something of value from frail nature's grave. +To other men in sorrow thou hast shown +The comfort left them: hast none for thine own? +Now, master, heal thyself: time is the cure +For all; but he whose wisdom doth abjure +The common ways, he should anticipate +The healing for which other men must wait. +What is time's cunning? That it drives away +Our former haps with newer ones, more gay, +Or like the old. So man by taking thought +Perceives them ere their accidents are wrought, +And by such thinking banishes the past +And views the future, quiet and steadfast. +Then bear man's portion like a man, my son, +The Lord of grief and comfort is but one." + Then I awoke, and know not if to deem +This truth itself, or but a passing dream. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Laments, by Jan Kochanowski + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LAMENTS *** + +***** This file should be named 27179.txt or 27179.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/2/7/1/7/27179/ + +Produced by Jimmy O'Regan (Produced from images generously +made available by Columbia University Libraries) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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