Sonnet from Camoens (186).
For we had been reading Camoens,--that poem, you remember,
Which his lady's eyes were praised in, as the sweetest ever seen.
Those eyes from whence chaste love was wont to glow,Os olhos onde o casto Amor ardia.
Camoens.
And smiled to see his torches kindled there;
That face within whose beauty strange and rare
The rosy light of dawn gleamed o'er the snow;
That hair, which bid the envious sun to know
His brightest beams less golden rays did wear;
That pure white hand, that gracious form and fair:
All these into the dust of earth must go.
O perfect beauty in its tenderest age!
O flower cut down ere it could all unfold
By the stern hand of unrelenting death!
Why did not Love itself quit earth's poor stage,
Not because here dwelt beauty's perfect mould,
But that so soon it passed from mortal breath?
Finis.
