European Elegies/Summer/To memory
76.TO MEMORY
Spirit that wakest when the weary windSleeps on the ocean and the moon is low,Son of the silent night, serene and slow,Thou art the sole soothsayer of my mind.
Faint as a far-off song thy light lip sighs,Low as a lute and lingeringly sweet,Lulling my fluttering bosom's fevered heat,Laying thy peace upon my panic eyes.
Thou canst discern the dream that broke my rest,Flooding the darkness with a fierce desireTo seek dead joys in ghosts of long ago;
Thou canst discern the sorrow of my breast,Its nameless fester and consuming fire,And thou alone canst heal its haggard woe.
From the Portuguese of Anthero de Quental.