Fragment On Death

And Paris be it or Helen dying, Who dies soever, dies with pain. He that lacks breath and wind for sighing, His gall bursts on his heart; and then He sweats, God knows what sweat!--again, No man may ease him of his grief; Child, brother, sister, none were fain To bail him thence for his relief.

Death makes him shudder, swoon, wax pale, Nose bend, veins stretch, and breath surrender, Neck swell, flesh soften, joints that fail Crack their strained nerves and arteries slender. O woman's body found so tender, Smooth, sweet, so precious in men's eyes, Must thou too bear such count to render? Yes; or pass quick into the skies.

[In the original here follows Villon's masterpiece, the matchless Ballad of the Ladies of Old Time, so incomparably rendered in the marvellous version of D. G. Rossetti; followed in its turn by the succeeding poem, as inferior to its companion as is my attempt at translation of it to his triumph in that higher and harder field.--A. C. S.]