Part 158

It is no passage for a little boat This which goes cleaving the audacious prow, Nor for a pilot who would spare himself.

“Why doth my face so much enamour thee, That to the garden fair thou turnest not, Which under the rays of Christ is blossoming?

There is the Rose in which the Word Divine Became incarnate; there the lilies are By whose perfume the good way was discovered.”

Thus Beatrice; and I, who to her counsels Was wholly ready, once again betook me Unto the battle of the feeble brows.

As in the sunshine, that unsullied streams Through fractured cloud, ere now a meadow of flowers Mine eyes with shadow covered o’er have seen,

So troops of splendours manifold I saw Illumined from above with burning rays, Beholding not the source of the effulgence.

O power benignant that dost so imprint them! Thou didst exalt thyself to give more scope There to mine eyes, that were not strong enough.

The name of that fair flower I e’er invoke Morning and evening utterly enthralled My soul to gaze upon the greater fire.

And when in both mine eyes depicted were The glory and greatness of the living star Which there excelleth, as it here excelled,

Athwart the heavens a little torch descended Formed in a circle like a coronal, And cinctured it, and whirled itself about it.

Whatever melody most sweetly soundeth On earth, and to itself most draws the soul, Would seem a cloud that, rent asunder, thunders,

Compared unto the sounding of that lyre Wherewith was crowned the sapphire beautiful, Which gives the clearest heaven its sapphire hue.

“I am Angelic Love, that circle round The joy sublime which breathes from out the womb That was the hostelry of our Desire;

And I shall circle, Lady of Heaven, while Thou followest thy Son, and mak’st diviner The sphere supreme, because thou enterest there.”

Thus did the circulated melody Seal itself up; and all the other lights Were making to resound the name of Mary.

The regal mantle of the volumes all Of that world, which most fervid is and living With breath of God and with his works and ways,

Extended over us its inner border, So very distant, that the semblance of it There where I was not yet appeared to me.

Therefore mine eyes did not possess the power Of following the incoronated flame, Which mounted upward near to its own seed.

And as a little child, that towards its mother Stretches its arms, when it the milk has taken, Through impulse kindled into outward flame,

Each of those gleams of whiteness upward reached So with its summit, that the deep affection They had for Mary was revealed to me.

Thereafter they remained there in my sight, ‘Regina coeli’ singing with such sweetness, That ne’er from me has the delight departed.

O, what exuberance is garnered up Within those richest coffers, which had been Good husbandmen for sowing here below!

There they enjoy and live upon the treasure Which was acquired while weeping in the exile Of Babylon, wherein the gold was left.

There triumpheth, beneath the exalted Son Of God and Mary, in his victory, Both with the ancient council and the new,

He who doth keep the keys of such a glory.

Paradiso: Canto XXIV

“O company elect to the great supper Of the Lamb benedight, who feedeth you So that for ever full is your desire,

If by the grace of God this man foretaste Something of that which falleth from your table, Or ever death prescribe to him the time,