Bliss Carman, et al., eds. The World’s Best Poetry.
Volume IV. The Higher Life. 1904. | | | | VII. Death: Immortality: Heaven | | “It kindles all my soul” | | Maciej Kazimierz Sarbiewski (1595–1640) |
| | From the Latin by John Mason Neale
“Urit me Patriæ decor.”
IT kindles all my soul, | |
| My country’s loveliness! Those starry choirs | |
| That watch around the pole, | |
| And the moon’s tender light, and heavenly fires | |
| Through golden halls that roll. | 5 |
| O chorus of the night! O planets, sworn | |
| The music of the spheres | |
| To follow! Lovely watchers, that think scorn | |
| To rest till day appears! | |
| Me, for celestial homes of glory born, | 10 |
| Why here, O, why so long, | |
| Do ye behold an exile from on high? | |
| Here, O ye shining throng, | |
| With lilies spread the mound where I shall lie: | |
| Here let me drop my chain, | 15 |
| And dust to dust returning, cast away | |
| The trammels that remain; | |
| The rest of me shall spring to endless day! | | | | |
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