TRANSLATIONS.

SONNET OF MICHEL ANGELO BUONAROTI.

TEVER did sculptor's dream unfold

NEVER

A form which marble doth not hold

In its white block; yet it therein shall find

Only the hand secure and bold

Which still obeys the mind.

So hide in thee, thou heavenly dame.

The ill I shun, the good I claim;

I alas! not well alive,

Miss the aim whereto I strive.

Not love, nor beauty's pride,

Nor Fortune, nor thy coldness, can I chide,

If, whilst within thy heart abide

Both death and pity, my unequal skill

Fails of the life, but draws the death and ill

THE EXILE.

FROM THE PERSIAN OF KERMANI.

In Farsistan the violet spreads

Its leaves to the rival sky;

I ask how far is the Tigris flood,
And the vine that grows thereby?

Except the amber morning wind,

Not one salutes me here;

There is no lover in all Bagdat

To offer the exile cheer.

I know that thou, O morning wind!

O'er Kernan's meadow blowest,

And thou, heart-warming nightingale!

My father's orchard knowest.

The merchant hath stuffs of price,

And gems from the sea-washed strand,

And princes offer me grace
To stay in the Syrian land;

But what is gold for, but for gifts? And dark, without love, is the day; And all that I see in Bagdat

Is the Tigris to float me away.

FROM HAFIZ.

I SAID to heaven that glowed above,

O hide yon sun-filled zone,

Hide all the stars you boast;

For, in the world of love

And estimation true,

The heaped-up harvest of the moon

Is worth one barley-corn at most,

The Pleiads' sheaf but two.

Ir my darling should depart,

And search the skies for prouder friends,

God forbid my angry heart

In other love should seek amends.

When the blue horizon's hoop

Me a little pinches here,

Instant to my grave

I stoop,

And go find thee in the sphere.

EPITAPH.

BETHINK, poor heart, what bitter kind of jest Mad Destiny this tender stripling played; For a warm breast of maiden to his breast,

She laid a slab of marble on his head.

THEY say, through patience, cnalk

Becomes a ruby stone;

Ah, yes but by the true heart's blood The chalk is crimson grown

FRIENDSHIP.

THOU foolish Hafiz! Say, do churls
Know the worth of Oman's pearls ?
Give the gem which dims the moon

To the noblest, or to none.

DEAREST, where thy shadow falls,
Beauty sits, and Music calls;
Where thy form and favor come,

All good creatures have their home.