Tuscan, that wanderest through the realms of gloom,
With thoughtful pace, and sad, majestic eyes,
Stern thoughts and awful from thy soul arise,
Like Farinata from his fiery tomb.
Thy sacred song is like the trump of doom;
Yet in thy heart what human sympathies,
What soft compassion glows, as in the skies
The tender stars their clouded lamps relume!
Methinks I see thee stand, with pallid cheeks,
By Fra Hilario in his diocese,
As up the convent-walls, in golden streaks,
The ascending sunbeams mark the day’s decrease;
And, as he asks what there the stranger seeks,
Thy voice along the cloister whispers, “Peace!”
DANTE
Analysis, meaning and summary of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's poem DANTE
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dude this poem rocks out loud!!! i love it peace!
Longfellow wrote the translation of the Dante works. He did most of it after his beloved wife, Frances, died tragically at a too early age. He found it hard to write his poetry after she died so he worked on the Dante translations. It helped him keep working through the intense grief.