The Ghent Review Volume1, Number 1, summer 2016 | Page 20

perilous waters and stares, so my mind, still fugitive, turned back to see that pass again, that
no living person ever left.

After I had rested my tired body a while, I made my way again over empty
ground, always bearing upwards to the right. And, behold, almost at the
start of the slope, a light swift leopard with spotted coat. It would not turn
from before my face, and so obstructed my path, that I often turned, in
order to return.
The time was at the beginning of the morning, and the sun was mounting
up with all those stars, that were with him when Divine Love first moved all
delightful things, so that the hour of day, and the sweet season, gave me fair
hopes of that creature with the bright pelt. But not so fair that I could avoid
fear at the sight of a lion, that appeared, and seemed to come at me, with
raised head and rabid hunger, so that it seemed the air itself was afraid; and
a she-wolf that looked full of craving in its leanness, and, before now, has
made many men live in sadness. She brought me such heaviness of fear,
from the aspect of her face, that I lost all hope of ascending. And as one who
is eager for gain, weeps, and is afflicted in his thoughts, if the moment
arrives when he loses, so that creature, without rest, made me like him: and
coming at me, little by little, drove me back to where the sun is silent.