To the Poet Martyr

^{translated from the Spanish by Ernest S. Green and Miss H. Von Lowenfels}

^{Juan Diaz Covarrubias}

                         I
   To-day, when at thy death 
Rises a song from every lute, 
And by which thou makest for thyself 
An altar of thy coffin; 
United to that youth 
Which thy history has just perused, 
While it sings the praises 
Which, through thee, spring from 
I also wish to place      [their breasts, 
My offering upon the altar.

                           II
    In the tomb where hovers 
Thy august and beloved spirit 
Lies broken, mute and asleep, 
The lyre of thy soul. 
Its chords will never more resound 
For fatherland or love, 
Except in the midst of sorrow 
Which sighs over thy marble-stone; 
That sublime silence 
Which is thy grandest song.

                                III
     This the song that rises 
From the harp of patriotism; 
This the same silence 
As liberty which sings, 
For in that holy conflict 
Where retrocession caused thee pain, 
When yielding under the weight 
Of that struggle which nothing 
Progress rose in joy              [respects.
Above the corpse of the poet.

                                  IV
    A monster whose memory 
Almost surpasses the dreadful, 
Who climed in Tacubaya 
To the scaffold of fame. 
Sacrificing thy glory he 
Believed his triumph more certain, 
Seeing not his mistake, 
And in his cruelty forgetting 
That words and songs are more mute 
Than the tongue of the dead.

                                     V 
   From thy existence 
He early tore the budding flower, 
Destroying in it the pride 
Of the American lyre. 
Thy superior inspiration 
Revolved before his contemptible 
But thy exquisite pen,                  [infamy,
Before breaking its flight, 
Took heaven for its page 
And wrote the eleventh of April.

                                   VI
     The fatherland to whom thou 
Didst offer thy holy life in tribute 
Weeps, and is clad 
In mourning in memory of thee; 
And breaking the best fruit 
From its glorious orchard, 
Erects to thee an altar, and upon it 
Crowns thy noble endurance 
With the double reward 
Of the palm and the laurel.

                                   VII
     If thy anxiety was to climb 
And rise to the infinite, 
Longing to leave thy name 
Written in the future, 
Well mayest thou sleep in peace, 
Inert within thy tomb, 
Whilst thy native land, on seeing thee, 
Proudly contemplates. 
That if thy life was beautiful, 
More beautiful was thy death.

1872.