O Divine Inconstancy, Have Pity on Me

Poem by Théodore Agrippa D'Aubigné Period 16th century

O divine Inconstancy, have pity on me,
Heal by wounding me my wound and my turmoil,
Forgive the spite of my hurried soul,
Forgive it the ills that, offended at first,
It spewed upon you, frenzied in wrath.
Change its will, your name will be sweet to it,
And as I have turned slander into praise,
Make a loving heart change to loving no more.
I will make you a rolling altar of a balloon,
I will sacrifice upon it leaves that Aquilo,
Your father, makes fall on us in the rainy autumn,
I will offer you the air of a ringing bell,
And the rooster that turned atop the steeple,
Dancing in a hundred ways; I will run to fetch you
Water and soap, and I will work wonders
Making bottles fly off a split straw;
I will offer down, feathers, flowers and thistles,
And water from the sea and little icicles,
A chameleon all alive, and instead of words,
I will speak without reason a hundred thousand trifles,
And consecrating all that to your immortal name,
I will burn still both the temple and the altar […]

Théodore Agrippa d’Aubigné

Translation generated by Poésies 123 with assistance from the deepseek-chat artificial-intelligence model.

Text published on Poésies 123: https://www.poesies123.com/en/poem-o-divine-inconstancy-have-pity-on-me-theodore-agrippa-d-aubigne/