Paradiso (45 page)
Authors: Dante
With his smile, Bernard signaled
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that I look upward, but of my own accord
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I was already doing what he wished,
for my sight, becoming pure,
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rose higher and higher through the ray
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of the exalted light that in itself is true.
From that time on my power of sight exceeded
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that of speech, which fails at such a vision,
Just as the dreamer, after he awakens,
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still stirred by feelings that the dream evoked,
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cannot bring the rest of it to mind,
such am I, my vision almost faded from my mind,
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while in my heart there still endures
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the sweetness that was born of it.
O Light exalted beyond mortal thought,
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grant that in memory I see again
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but one small part of how you then appeared
and grant my tongue sufficient power
that it may leave behind a single spark
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of glory for the people yet to come,
since, if you return but briefly to my mind
and then resound but softly in these lines,
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the better will your victory be conceived.
I believe, from the keenness of the living ray
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that I endured, I would have been undone
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had I withdrawn my eyes from it.
And I remember that, on this account,
I grew more bold and thus sustained my gaze
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until I reached the Goodness that is infinite.
O plenitude of grace, by which I could presume
to fix my eyes upon eternal Light
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until my sight was spent on it!
In its depth I saw contained,
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by love into a single volume bound,
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the pages scattered through the universe:
substances, accidents, and the interplay between them,
as though they were conflated in such ways
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that what I tell is but a simple light.
I believe I understood the universal form
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of this dense knot because I feel my joy expand,
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rejoicing as I speak of it.
Thus all my mind, absorbed,
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was gazing, fixed, unmoving and intent,
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becoming more enraptured in its gazing.
He who beholds that Light is so enthralled
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that he would never willingly consent
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to turn away from it for any other sight,
because the good that is the object of the will
is held and gathered in perfection there
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that elsewhere would imperfect show.
Now my words will come far short
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of what I still remember, like a babe’s
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who at his mother’s breast still wets his tongue.
Not that the living Light at which I gazed
took on other than a single aspect—
but that my sight was gaining strength, even as I gazed
at that sole semblance and, as I changed,
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it too was being, in my eyes, transformed.
In the deep, transparent essence of the lofty Light
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there appeared to me three circles
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having three colors but the same extent,
and each one seemed reflected by the other
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as rainbow is by rainbow, while the third seemed fire,
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equally breathed forth by one and by the other.
O how scant is speech, too weak to frame my thoughts.
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Compared to what I still recall my words are faint—
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to call them “little” is to praise them much.
O eternal Light, abiding in yourself alone,
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knowing yourself alone, and, known to yourself
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and knowing, loving and smiling on yourself!
That circling which, thus conceived,
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appeared in you as light’s reflection,
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once my eyes had gazed on it a while, seemed,
within itself and in its very color,
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to be painted with our likeness,
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so that my sight was all absorbed in it.
Like the geometer who fully applies himself
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to square the circle and, for all his thought,
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cannot discover the principle he lacks,
such was I at that strange new sight.
I tried to see how the image fit the circle
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But my wings had not sufficed for that
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had not my mind been struck by a bolt
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of lightning that granted what I asked.
Here my exalted vision lost its power.
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But now my will and my desire, like wheels revolving
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with an even motion, were turning with
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PARADISO I
La gloria di colui che tutto move
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per l’universo penetra, e risplende
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in una parte più e meno altrove.
Nel ciel che più de la sua luce prende
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fu’ io, e vidi cose che ridire
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né sa né può chi di là sù discende;
perché appressando sé al suo disire,
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nostro intelletto si profonda tanto,
O buono Appollo, a l’ultimo lavoro
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fammi del tuo valor sì fatto vaso,
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come dimandi a dar l’amato alloro.
Infino a qui l’un giogo di Parnaso
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assai mi fu; ma or con amendue
O divina virtù, se mi ti presti
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tanto che l’ombra del beato regno
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segnata nel mio capo io manifesti,
vedra’mi al piè del tuo diletto legno
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venire, e coronarmi de le foglie
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che la materia e tu mi farai degno.
Sì rade volte, padre, se ne coglie
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per trïunfare o cesare o poeta,
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colpa e vergogna de l’umane voglie,
che parturir letizia in su la lieta
delfica deïtà dovria la fronda
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peneia, quando alcun di sé asseta.
Poca favilla gran fiamma seconda:
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forse di retro a me con miglior voci
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si pregherà perché Cirra risponda.
