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Dante's Hell Translation Canto Xxxiii Part2

We passed over, where was held in frost state
Harshly contained people of the next band,
Not down bent, but all lying in quite strait.

Weeping itself  the tears does not disband,
And pain which finds in eyes of hitch so much,
Rebounds inside to grow and pain expand;

Since tears fast become iced in a way such
That as they were crystal shields put on face,
Fill all pit under  lashes , eyes touch.

And notwithstanding events in that space,
Had in such cold my feeling embroiled so
That any sense from my face could efface,

I felt already wind enter and go;
So I: “My master, who is moving this?
Is not of any vapor here stopped flow?

So he to me: “More onwards you assists
The answer which your own eyes then shall see,
Watching why is this wind  in the abyss”.

And one of wretched in the frosted sea
Screamed toward us: “Souls so cruel indeed
Since you can still at last stop here, a plea:

Wipe away from my face the frozen bead,
So that I can to heart pain give vent,
A little, before tears to chill must cede”.

So I : “If you want that your plea assent,
Tell me who you are now, and fast quite be,
Because to end of  ice is my descent”.

Answered then: “Friar Alberic is me;
I am the one of fruits from garden bad,
And here I now keep dates for figs, you see”.

“Oh!”, I told him, “already death you had?”.
And he to me: “The way my body is
Up in world, I have no knowledge or ad.

Such advantage has Ptolomaea this,
That many times the soul here has to fall
Before Atropos goddess its move does.

And so that you more fain clean me well all
The frozen tears out from my wretched face,
Be aware that, after soul receives call

As me, its body is kept to displace
By a demon, who after then takes it
The entire time its life will then take place.

The soul crashes in this so made bucket;
And yet the body up there can be seen
Of the shadow here back you watch to fit.

You now must know that, if down to me lean:
He is sir Branca Doria, years are
Just many passed after he came here, mean”

“I think”, I told, “that you me cheating were;
Since Branca Doria lives, he never died,
And still eats and drinks and sleeps and wears far”.

“In Malebranches up”, he told, the ditch side,
Where the hot pitch just boils tenacious much,
Not yet Michael Zanche had arrived and lied,

When this left the devil in his place such
As his body, like a partner of him
And joined as traitors they got in touch.

But now extend your hand and gently skim
My eyes to open”. I refused to do;
And politeness was to behave so grim.

Alas Genoese, men so overdue
In any morals and of blemish full,
Why from world dissipated are not you?

Since with the worst Romagna’s soul as rule
I found one of yours, who due to his acts
As soul in Cocytus he received pull,

And his body looks live up as in facts.

Copyright © Mario De Paz | Year Posted 2015

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