Знаменитый английский ренессансный поэт сэр Филип Сидни (1554 — 1586) начал перекладывать английскими стихами псалмы Давида. Его сестра, Мэри Сидни Герберт, графиня Пембрук (1561–1621) продолжила и окончила этот труд, составивший в значительной мере ее литературную славу.
Далее следуют сопровождавшие публикацию этого перевода псалмов стихи сестры, Мэри Сидни Герберт, графини Пембрук в память брата, сэра Филипа Сидни, и мой их перевод. Сестра братом очень восхищается, потому тон стихов возвышенный.
Источник текста оригинала: Women Writers in Renaissance England. An Annotated Anthology edited by Randall Martin. Pearson Education Limited, 2010
Оригинал:
Mary Herbert, Countess of Pembroke (1561–1621)
To the Angel Spirit of the Most Excellent Sir Philip Sidney
To thee, pure sprite, to thee alone’s addressed
This coupled work, by double interest thine:
First raised by thy blest hand, and what is mine
Inspired by thee, thy secret power impressed.
So dared my Muse with thine itself combine,
As mortal stuff with that which is divine.
Thy lightning beams give luster to the rest,
That heaven’s King may deign his own transformed,
In substance no, but superficial tire
By thee put on; to praise, not to aspire
To those high tones, so in themselves adorned,
Which angels sing in their celestial choir –
And all of tongues with soul and voice admire
These sacred hymns thy kingly prophet formed.
O, had that soul which honor brought to rest
Too soon not left and reft the world of all
What man could show which we perfection call,
This half-maimed piece had sorted with the best.
Deep wounds enlarged, long festered in their gall,
Fresh bleeding smart; not eye- but heart-tears fall.
Ah, memory, what needs this new arrest?
Yet here behold (O, wert thou to behold!)
This finished now, thy matchless Muse begun,
The rest but pieced, as left by thee undone.
Pardon (O blest soul) presumption too, too bold;
If love and zeal such error ill become,
Tis zealous love, love which hath never done
Nor can enough in world of words unfold.
And sith it hath no further scope to go,
Nor other purpose but to honor thee,
Thee in thy works where all the graces be,
As little streams with all their all do flow
To their great sea, due tribute’s grateful fee,
So press my thoughts, my burdened thoughts, in me
To pay the debt of infinites I owe
To thy great worth, exceeding nature’s store,
Wonder of men, sole born perfection’s kind.
Phoenix thou wert, so rare thy fairest mind,
Heavenly adorned, earth justly might adore,
Where truthful praise in highest glory shined;
For there alone was praise to truth confined,
And where but there, to live for evermore?
O, when to this account, this cast-up sum,
This reckoning made, this audit of my woe,
I call my thoughts, whence so strange passions flow,
How works my heart, my senses stricken dumb,
That would thee more than ever heart could show?
And all too short who knew thee best doth know
There lives no wit that may thy praise become.
Truth I invoke (who scorn elsewhere to move,
Or here in ought my blood should partialize),
Truth, sacred Truth, thee sole to solemnize.
Those precious rites well known best minds approve;
And who but doth, hath wisdom’s open eyes,
Not, owly blind, the fairest light still flies,
Confirm no less? At least tis sealed above,
Where thou art fixed among thy fellow lights:
My day put out, my life in darkness cast,
Thy angel’s soul, with highest angels placed,
There bless`ed sings, enjoying heaven delights,
Thy Maker’s praise, as far from earthly taste
As here thy works, so worthily embraced
By all of worth, where never envy bites.
As goodly buildings to some glorious end
Cut off by fate before the Graces had
Each wondrous part in all their beauties clad,
Yet so much done as art could not amend,
So thy rare works, to which no wit can add,
In all men’s eyes which are not blindly mad
Beyond compare above all praise extend.
Immortal monuments of thy fair fame,
Though not complete, nor in the reach of thought –
How on that passing piece time would have wrought
Had heaven so spared the life of life to frame
The rest? But ah, such loss, hath this world ought
Can equal it, or which like grievance brought?
Yet there will live thy ever-prais`ed name.
To which these dearest offerings of my heart,
Dissolved to ink, while pen’s impressions move
The bleeding veins of never-dying love,
I render here: these wounding lines of smart,
Sad characters indeed of simple love,
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