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a collection of literature from poets, bards, songwriters, and skalds in the SCA

Sonette XXVIII

olivier's picture
olivier
Poem (Canso): 

From darkness cold I make my way to light,
Though before me the path seems no more clear
But to display my single shadow near.
Hope I that my love is shrouded by night!
If only her face moved within my sight
To give me assurance and needed cheer.
O love, that thy release I could but hear,
Then would I laugh before these gates of blight
And herald loud thy return to God’s land.
But some impish thing about me did spin
A cloak of doubt and fear made by Fate’s hand.
Let our speed grow more as my hope grows thin.
Love lost and found again hath heavy toll,
But to be lost again cost man his soul.

Documentation / Explanation (Razo): 

3. single shadow: Orphos here seems to be noting that he can’t see Euredissa behind him by any visible shadow of hers that might creep ahead within his field of vision (making him wonder if Hades lied to him), but she is also still theoretically a ghost and may not have one.
8. blight: pestilence.
10. impish: devilish.
11. “cloak of doubt … hand.”: Here Fate has woven an entire cloak to place about Orphos, rather than the traditional thread of life that the Greek Fates are said to have spun and cut at the moment of death.