Sonnets from the Crimea/On Juda's Cliff

←The Ruins of Balaclava

On Juda's Cliff  (1917)  by Adam Mickiewicz, translated by Edna W. Underwood

ON JUDA'S CLIFF

On Juda's Cliff I love to lean and look  On waves that battling beat and break with might, While farther seaward in a bland delight,  I see them shining where a rainbow shook. On Juda's Cliff I love to lean and look  On waves that like sea-armies swing to sight, To send upon the shore their billows white,  And, ebbing, to leave pearls in every nook. Thus, Poet, in your youth when storms are wild  And passions break upon the heart and brain, To leave their ruin there—shipwreck and waste—  Pick up your lute! Upon it undefiled You'll find song-pearls that your heart-deeps retain,  The crown the years have brought you, white and chaste.