Don Quixote

by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

And while I suffer thus, there comes no ray Of hope to gladden me athwart the gloom; Nor do I look for it in my despair; But rather clinging to a cureless woe, All hope do I abjure for evermore. Can there be hope where fear is? Were it well, When far more certain are the grounds of fear? Ought I to shut mine eyes to jealousy, If through a thousand heart-wounds it appears? Who would not give free access to distrust, Seeing disdain unveiled, and — bitter change! — All his suspicions turned to certainties, And the fair truth transformed into a lie? Oh, thou fierce tyrant of the realms of love, Oh, Jealousy! put chains upon these hands, And bind me with thy strongest cord, Disdain. But, woe is me! triumphant over all, My sufferings drown the memory of you. And now I die, and since there is no hope Of happiness for me in life or death, Still to my fantasy I’ll fondly cling. I’ll say that he is wise who loveth well, And that the soul most free is that most bound In thraldom to the ancient tyrant Love. I’ll say that she who is mine enemy In that fair body hath as fair a mind, And that her coldness is but my desert, And that by virtue of the pain be sends Love rules his kingdom with a gentle sway. Thus, self-deluding, and in bondage sore, And wearing out the wretched shred of life To which I am reduced by her disdain, I’ll give this soul and body to the winds, All hopeless of a crown of bliss in store. Thou whose injustice hath supplied the cause That makes me quit the weary life ...