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“Out of courtesy I consent to your keeping, Señor, the ones you already have, but to think that I won’t burn those that remain is to think vain thoughts.”

Vivaldo, who wanted to see what the papers said, immediately opened one of them and saw that it had as a title “Song of Despair.” When Ambrosio heard the title, he said:

“This is the last paper the unfortunate man wrote; and so that you may see, Señor, the lengths to which his misfortunes had driven him, read it aloud so that all may hear, for the time it will take to dig the grave will be more than enough time for you to read it.”

“I will do that gladly,” said Vivaldo.

And since all those present had the same desire, they came to stand around him, and Vivaldo, reading in a clear voice, saw that it said:

CHAPTER XIV

In which are found the desperate verses of the deceased shepherd, along with other unexpected occurrences

GRISÓSTOMO’S SONG

Since you, most cruel, wish all tongues to proclaim,

all men to know the harsh power of your will,

I will have hell itself teach a mournful song

to my grieving breast; then add to that discord

with the stridency of this my tuneless voice.

And, companion to my desire as it strives

to tell of my sorrow and your heartless deeds,

that fearful voice will resound; worse torment,

it will carry pieces of my wretched heart.

Listen, then, to no harmonious song

but to the clangor rising from the depths

of my embittered breast, and borne by frenzy,

sounding to my delight and your displeasure.

The roar of the lion, the fearful howling

of the savage wolf, the terrible hisses

of the scaly serpent, the ghastly shrieks of

monsters, the portents of the raven’s croak,

the din of winds battling unsettled seas,

the great bull’s vengeful bellow in defeat,

the widowed turtledove’s heartbroken call,

the grief-stricken hooting of the envied owl, and

the cries of all the souls in darkest hell,

let these join with my spirit in its grief,

blending in song, confounding all the senses,

for the merciless anguish I endure

demands new modes, new styles, for its recounting.

The wailing echoes of this dissonance

will not be heard on sands of Father Tajo,

or in the Andalusian olive groves:

my heartless agony will be carried by

a dead man’s tongue, in words that will survive him,

to craggy heights, or bottomless ravines,

to darkened valleys, to some hostile shore

bare of human commerce, or to places where

the sunlight ne’er was seen, or to the hordes of

ravening toxic beasts that live and thrive

on the Libyan plain; for though in desert wastes

the hoarse, uncertain echoes of my ills

may sound with unmatched harshness, like your own,

as a privilege of my destiny cut short,

they will be carried all around the world.

Disdain can kill, suspicions true or false

can bring down patience; and jealousy slays

with grim ferocity; long absence can

confound a life; feared oblivion defeats

the surest hope for a life of happiness.

In all this, certain death cannot be fled;

but I—O wondrous miracle!—I live on

jealous, absent, disdained, and certain of

suspicions that fell me, forgotten by one

for whom I burn with ever hotter flame,

and in so much torment I can never see

even the shadow of hope that, in despair,

I do not attempt to find; rather, to carry

my woe to the furthest extreme, I vow

eternally to live bereft of hope.

Can one feel hope and at the same time fear,

or is it wise to do so when the reasons

for fear are so much stronger? Must I then

close these eyes when flint-hard jealousy

appears before them, only to watch it tear

a thousand open wounds deep in my soul?

Who would not open wide the door to despair

when he sees disdain undisguised, laid bare,

when he sees all his suspicions, oh bitter

transformation, converted into truths,

and honest truth transmuted into lies?

O jealousy, in the kingdom of love

a pitiless tyrant, place these my hands

in chains. And condemn me, disdain,

to be bound in twisted