CANTO XXI
My eyes were already fixed on the face
Of My Lady, and my mind with them—
All other thoughts had been wiped away.
She wasn’t smiling; instead, she began:
“If I were smiling, you’d become
Like Semele when she was turned to ashes,
Because my beauty—which, as you’ve seen,
Lights up more the higher one rises
On the steps of the eternal palace—
If it weren’t tempered, would be so dazzling
That, if it flashed, your human faculties would be
Ripped apart like a branch by a thunderbolt.
We’ve risen to the seventh splendor,
Which, beneath the breast of fiery Leo the Lion,
Shines down now mixed with its powers. 15
Keep your mind fixed behind your eyes
And let your eyes make mirrors of the figure
That’s going to appear to you in this mirror.”
Only someone who understood what it was
To feast my eyes on that blessed face,
When I turned my attention elsewhere
Would appreciate—by weighing one side
Against the other—how much it must have
Pleased me to obey my heavenly escort.
Within that crystal which, circling the world,
Bears the name of its beloved Saturn—
Under whose rule every act of ill will lay dead—
I saw a ladder, the color of gold
Struck by a ray of sunlight, rising so high
I couldn’t follow it all the way up. 30
I also saw so many splendors coming down
The rungs that I thought every light one sees
In the heavens was pouring down from there.
The way jackdaws, assembled at daybreak,
As per their natural habit,
Move about to warm their cold feathers,
Then some fly off without returning,
While others circle and come back,
And still others keep wheeling overhead,
That’s how it seemed to me it was
With those in that sparkling mass that came
Together as soon as it hit a certain step.
And the one that stopped closest to us
Became so bright that I said to myself,
“I clearly see the love you’re showing me. 45
Although she, to whom I look for the how
And when to speak or to keep quiet, is still;
So, in spite of wanting to, think it’s best not to ask.”
At which point she, who saw my silence
With the sight of Him who sees all,
Told me: “Go ahead, satisfy your burning wish.”
At which I began: “My own merit
Doesn’t make me worthy of your answer,
But for the sake of the one who allows me to ask,
Blessed soul that stays hidden
Inside your own happiness, please let me know
Why you’ve been placed so close to me
And why the sweet symphony of Paradise
Is silent in this circle while, throughout the others
Below, it sounds so devout.” 60
“You have mortal hearing, the same
As your sight,” he told me. “Why Beatrice
Didn’t smile is why we aren’t singing here.
I came down the rungs of the sacred ladder
This far only to welcome you with words
And with the light that surrounds me.
Nor was it greater love that made me more eager—
As much and more love is burning up there,
As the flaming makes clear to you;
But the exalted charity that makes us quick
To serve the council that governs the world,
Assigns us here, as you can see.”
“Sacred light,” I said, “I indeed see
How unfettered love in this Court is sufficient
For following the lead of Eternal Providence, 75
But what’s difficult for me to discern is this:
Why were you alone, among your associates,
Predestined to this task.”
I hadn’t even come to the last word
When the light made a pivot of its middle,
Spinning itself like a high-speed millstone.
The love inside it then responded:
“Divine light is focused on me, penetrating
Through this in which I’m enwombed;
Its power, combined with my vision,
Lifts me so high above myself, that I can see
The Supreme Essence from which it’s drawn.
From this comes the joy with which I blaze.
In terms of my sight, however clear that is,
It matches the clarity of my flame. 90
Even the most enlightened soul in heaven,
That Seraph whose eye is most fixed on God,
Couldn’t satisfy your demand,
Because what you ask goes so deep into the abyss
Of the eternal edict, that it’s detached
From the sight of everything created.
Communicate this to the mortal world
When you return, so it won’t presume
To move its feet any more toward such a goal.
The mind, which here is light, on earth is shrouded
In mist, so how can it see down there what can’t
Be seen here, even though heaven lifts it up?”
To me, his words were so prescriptive
That I let the question go and limited myself
To humbly asking who he was. 105
“Between the two shores of Italy, not too distant
From your birthplace, rise cliffs so high
The thunder on the mountain is heard far below.
They form a ridge called Catria,
Under which is a consecrated hermitage,
Which once was solely devoted to worship.”
He began speaking to me a third time like that,
And then went on to say: “There
I became so steadfast in the service of God
That, with food dressed only in olive oil,
I easily endured the heat and the cold,
Content with my contemplative thoughts.
That cloister used to deliver in abundance
To these heavens, but now it’s a waste land
That needs to be exposed, and soon. 120
In that place, I was known as Peter Damian,
And as Peter the Sinner
In the House of Our Lady on the Adriatic coast.
I had little mortal life left when I was called up
And dragged off to that cardinal’s hat
Which is ever being sent from bad to worse.
Cephas came along, and that great vessel
Of the Holy Spirit too, thin and barefoot,
Taking their food at whatever hostel.
Today’s modern shepherds are so full of themselves,
They want someone on either side, like props:
One to lead, and one behind to carry their trains.
Their fur-lined cloaks so totally cover their horses,
There’s room for two beasts under one pelt.
O patience, you put up with so much!” 135
At these words, I saw more flames
Descending from rung to rung, and whirling;
And each whirl made them more beautiful.
They surrounded him and then stood still
And shouted with such a loud roar, there’s never
Been anything like it heard down here.
Nor did I catch it, I was so stunned by the thunder.
CANTO XXII
Awestruck, I turned to my guide
Like some little kid who keeps running back
To the one in whom they have the most confidence,
And she—like a mother who’s quick to soothe
Her pale and breathless child with a voice
That’s always ready to respond—
Said to me: “Don’t you get that you’re in heaven?
And don’t you get that heaven is entirely holy,
And what’s done here is done with righteous zeal?
Now, you can imagine how singing or my smiling
Would have totally turned you inside out,
Since this shouting has so rattled you;
If you’d understood the prayers in it,
You’d already be aware
Of the vengeance you’ll see before you die. 15
The sword here on high doesn’t cut too fast
Or too slow, although it may seem that way
To one wishing or fearing while waiting for it.
But turn around now to the others;
Those are extremely illustrious spirits
You’ll see if you look where I’m telling you to.”
As she wished, I turned and saw a hundred
Small sunlike spheres all further embellishing
One another with their mutual rays.
I stood there like those who stifle the pinprick
Of desire deep inside themselves and don’t even
Venture to ask, for fear of asking too much.
The largest and the most radiant
Of those pearls made its way forward
To satisfy my wish to know about it. 30
From within it, I heard: “If you could see,
As I can, the love that burns among us,
You would have said what you were thinking.
But so that you don’t delay your lofty goal
By waiting, I’ll respond to you, even
To the thought about which you’re so concerned.
The summit of that mountain that has Cassino
At its base was once used by people
Who were deluded and vicious,
And I’m the one who first carried up there
The name of Him who brought down to earth
The truth that so uplifts us.
So much grace shone upon me I was able to move
The surrounding countryside away
From the impious cult that had seduced the world. 45
These other flames were all contemplative types
While living, set on fire by that heat
That gives birth to holy flowers and fruits.
Here’s Macarius, here’s Romauldo,
Here are my brothers who ended their paths
Inside their cloisters and kept their hearts steadfast.”
“The affection you openly show by talking
With me, and the kind expression that I see
And observe in your love of all of those burning,
Has expanded my trust—like the sun does
With the rose when it opens out
To become all it can possibly be.
So that I beg you—and father, make certain
That I can take that much grace—to allow me
To see you with your face unmasked.” 60
To which he said, “Brother, your exalted wish
Will be fulfilled in the last sphere
Where all the others are fulfilled, and mine as well.
There, every desire is perfect, mature,
And whole. Only in that one sphere
Is every element there, where it always was.
Because it’s not in space, and it’s un-poled,
And our ladder reaches up to it—
Which is why it vanishes from your sight—
All the way up to where the patriarch Jacob
Saw it extend its uppermost rung,
When it appeared to him so laden with angels.
But now, no one’s foot leaves the ground
To climb it, and my former Rule
Is nothing but a waste of paper. 75
The walls that used to be the abbey
Have become dens and the monk’s habits
Are nasty sacks filled with rancid flour.
Even the weight of usury doesn’t decrease
God’s pleasure nearly as much as that fruit
That makes the monks’ hearts so deranged.
Because whatever the Church oversees is totally
For those who ask in God’s name, not for
Nepotistic relatives, or for even more odious others.
The flesh of mortals is so fragile down there
That a good beginning doesn’t last
As long as it takes an oak seed to make an acorn.
Peter began without gold and without silver,
And I with only prayer and fasting,
And St. Francis began his convent with humility. 90
If you look at the beginning of each, and then
Look again to see where it’s gone off-kilter,
You’ll see the pure white has been dirtied.
Seriously, Jordan driven back and the Red Sea
Parting when God willed it were far more
Wondrous to witness than a rescue here would be.”
He told me this, then rejoined his companions;
His companions then closed ranks—at which
They all rose up together like a whirlwind.
My gentle Lady, with a single gesture,
Urged me on behind them up that staircase—
Her power so overcame my human nature.
Never down here, where one goes up and down
According to nature’s laws, has there ever been
Motion so fast that it could match my flight. 105
If ever I return, Reader, to that devout
Triumph—for which I often bemoan
My sins and beat my chest—
You would not have snatched back your finger
And put it in the fire as fast as I saw
The sign that follows Taurus, and was in it.
O glorious stars, O light saturated
With great power, with which I identify
All of my ingenuity, whatever it might be!
The sun, the parent of every mortal life,
Was rising with you, and being tucked away
With you, when I first breathed the Tuscan air.
And then, when grace was granted to me
To enter the exalted circle that spins you around,
Gemini, your region was assigned to me. 120
My soul is now devotedly sighing to you,
That it may gain strength for the next
Difficult step to which I am being drawn.
“You’re so near the ultimate level
Of salvation,” began Beatrice,
“That your sight needs to be clear and sharp.
But before you become more one-within-it,
Look down and see how much of the universe
I’ve already set beneath your feet,
So that your heart will appear as joyful
As it possibly can to the triumphant crowd
That happily comes to this ethereal sphere.”
Facing them, I went back through all seven
Of the spheres, and seeing how small
The marble was, I smiled at its puny appearance. 135
The judgement I most value is that of those
Who cling to it least, and those who consider
Other things can be called truly virtuous.
I saw the moon shining bright,
Without those shadows I’d earlier thought
Were caused by differences in density.
I looked your bright son right in the face,
Hyperion, and saw how, nearby, Mercury
And Venus run circles around him.
Then, I saw how Jupiter was tempered
Between his father Saturn and son Mars, and then
It became clear how they vary where they are.
And all seven established for me
How huge they are and how fast they are
And how far apart their houses are. 150
That little patch of land that makes us so fierce,
Circling with the eternal Twins, was all revealed
To me, from the hills to the mouths of rivers.
I then turned my eyes back to those beautiful eyes.
CANTO XXIII
Like a bird, amid the beloved leaves,
Perched near the nest of her downy young
All through the night that conceals things from us,
And longing to see how they look
And to find food with which to feed them—
Hard work but welcome to her—
She anticipates the time on the open branch,
Waiting with ardent affection for the sun,
Watching intently for the break of day;
That was how My Lady was, bolt upright
And totally focused, turned toward the meridian
Beneath which the sun seems less hurried.
Seeing her so eagerly expectant, I became
Someone who wants what the other wants,
So hopes the wish will be fulfilled— 15
That said, there was little time between one
And the other “when” of my waiting
And seeing the sky progressively brighten.
Beatrice said, “Here are the hosts
Of the triumph of Christ, and all the fruit
Gathered by the turning of these spheres.”
It seemed to me that her face was totally glowing
And her eyes were so full of joy,
I have to move along without adding to that.
As when on a clear night there’s a full moon
And Diana smiles amid the eternal nymphs
That dot-paint the heavens across all its hollows,
I saw, above thousands of lights,
A Sun that ignites each and every one,
Just as ours does the stars we see above. 30
Through the vivid light, the glow
Of the luminous Substance was so bright
On my face, I couldn’t bear it.
O Beatrice, my kind and beloved guide!
She told me: “What overwhelms you is a force
Against which nothing can shield itself.
In It is the Wisdom and the Power
That opened the highways between Heaven
And Earth, which had for so long been desired.”
The way lightning breaks from a cloud,
By expanding until it can’t be contained,
And, contrary to its own nature, falls to earth,
So my mind, having expanded so greatly
From all those feasts, was released from itself—
And what it became, it can’t recall. 45
“Open your eyes and see me as I am;
You’ve seen things now that have made you
Strong enough to withstand my smile.”
I was like someone who still feels the effects
Of a dream, and keeps trying in vain
To bring it back to mind,
When I heard that offer, worthy
Of such gratitude that it can never be erased
From the book in which the past gets written.
Even if all that long-ago eloquence
Polyhymnia and her sisters nourished
With their sweetest milk were to ring out now
To help me, it wouldn’t come to a mere fraction
Of the truth, in singing about her holy smile
And the way it lit up her holy face. 60
And so, in painting a picture of Paradise,
The sacred poem has to swerve—
Like someone who finds their path cut off.
Although anyone who considers the weighty
Theme, wouldn’t blame the mortal shoulder
If it trembled beneath what it was burdened by;
This is no course for a little skiff which, even so,
This daring prow goes plowing through,
Nor for a pilot who’d take the easy way out.
“Why are you so enamored with my face
That you don’t turn to the beautiful garden
That’s flowering beneath Christ’s rays?
In it is the Rose in which the Divine Word
Was made flesh, in it are the lilies
Toward whose fragrance the right way was taken.” 75
So said Beatrice; and I, totally inclined
To follow her guidance, now went back
To the battle with my delicate eyesight.
The same way that—the sun streaming
Unfiltered through a broken cloud, my eyes shaded
To protect them—I once saw a field of flowers,
I now saw a multitude of bright lights
Lit from above by fiery rays, although
I wasn't able to see the source of the brightness.
O benevolent Power, who so imprints them, You
Rose to more exalted heights to give more space
For my eyes, which were powerless before You.
The name of the beautiful flower I ever invoke,
Morning and evening, totally compelled
My mind to concentrate on the highest flame. 90
And as soon as both eyes were painted with
The depth and breadth of that living star who
Outshines up there as she outshined down here,
From out of the heavens a flame descended,
A crown-shaped circular form
Which haloed her, then whirled around her.
Whatever melody sounds sweetest on earth,
And draws the soul closest to it, would seem
Like thunder crashing through a cloud
Compared to the sound of that lyre that came
From the crown of the beautiful sapphire
With which the brightest heaven is ensapphired.
“I am angelic love, which circles
The sublime joy inspired by the womb
That was the guesthouse of our Desire, 105
And I will circle, Lady of Heaven,
Until you follow your son and by entering
The supreme sphere, you make it more divine.”
That’s how the circling melody concluded itself,
At which all the other lights
Made the air resound with Mary’s name.
The royal mantle of the highest of all
The universe’s revolving spheres, and the one
Most enlivened by the breath of God and His ways,
Had its inner margin so far above us
That its semblance, from there where I was,
Was still not apparent to me,
Since my eyes didn’t have the power
To follow the crowned flame
That rose up after her offspring. 120
Like a baby that turns to its mother,
Holding out its arms after taking its milk,
Its inner feelings prompting its outer actions,
Each of those immaculate flames stretched upward
With its pointed tip, so that the deep affection
They had for Mary was easily readable to me.
They then stayed in my sight,
Singing “Queen of Heaven” so sweetly
That the delight of it has never left me.
Oh, what abundance is stored up
In those opulent coffers, that was sown
On earth by such good plowmen.
Up here they live and enjoy the treasure
Bought with tears during the Babylonian exile,
When they left behind their gold. 135
Up here he triumphs in his victory,
Beneath the exalted Son of God and Mary,
With both the old and the new covenants,
The one who holds the keys to all that glory.