Perchance six thousand miles remote from us
  Is glowing the sixth hour, and now this world
  Inclines its shadow almost to a level,

When the mid-heaven begins to make itself
  So deep to us, that here and there a star
  Ceases to shine so far down as this depth,

And as advances bright exceedingly
  The handmaid of the sun, the heaven is closed
  Light after light to the most beautiful;

Not otherwise the Triumph, which for ever
  Plays round about the point that vanquished me,
  Seeming enclosed by what itself encloses,

Little by little from my vision faded;
  Whereat to turn mine eyes on Beatrice
  My seeing nothing and my love constrained me.

If what has hitherto been said of her
  Were all concluded in a single praise,
  Scant would it be to serve the present turn.

Not only does the beauty I beheld
  Transcend ourselves, but truly I believe
  Its Maker only may enjoy it all.

Vanquished do I confess me by this passage
  More than by problem of his theme was ever
  O'ercome the comic or the tragic poet;

For as the sun the sight that trembles most,
  Even so the memory of that sweet smile
  My mind depriveth of its very self.

From the first day that I beheld her face
  In this life, to the moment of this look,
  The sequence of my song has ne'er been severed;

But now perforce this sequence must desist
  From following her beauty with my verse,
  As every artist at his uttermost.

Such as I leave her to a greater fame
  Than any of my trumpet, which is bringing
  Its arduous matter to a final close,

With voice and gesture of a perfect leader
  She recommenced: "We from the greatest body
  Have issued to the heaven that is pure light;

Light intellectual replete with love,
  Love of true good replete with ecstasy,
  Ecstasy that transcendeth every sweetness.

Here shalt thou see the one host and the other
  Of Paradise, and one in the same aspects
  Which at the final judgment thou shalt see."

Even as a sudden lightning that disperses
  The visual spirits, so that it deprives
  The eye of impress from the strongest objects,

Thus round about me flashed a living light,
  And left me swathed around with such a veil
  Of its effulgence, that I nothing saw.

"Ever the Love which quieteth this heaven
  Welcomes into itself with such salute,
  To make the candle ready for its flame."

No sooner had within me these brief words
  An entrance found, than I perceived myself
  To be uplifted over my own power,

And I with vision new rekindled me,
  Such that no light whatever is so pure
  But that mine eyes were fortified against it.

And light I saw in fashion of a river
  Fulvid with its effulgence, 'twixt two banks
  Depicted with an admirable Spring.

Out of this river issued living sparks,
  And on all sides sank down into the flowers,
  Like unto rubies that are set in gold;

And then, as if inebriate with the odours,
  They plunged again into the wondrous torrent,
  And as one entered issued forth another.

"The high desire, that now inflames and moves thee
  To have intelligence of what thou seest,
  Pleaseth me all the more, the more it swells.

But of this water it behoves thee drink
  Before so great a thirst in thee be slaked."
  Thus said to me the sunshine of mine eyes;