As long as the Piavé floweth down
Green chasms in the everlasting course
Of ages, smiting Adria's breast with spoils
Uprooted from the dusky woods that gave

Pine trees to old Saint Mark, for masts of war
Towering down yonder in the Echinades ;
As long as setting suns their colours weave
About the peaks of the wan Dolomites,

Until in the hushed eventide, as red
As roses, flush the Marmarolé dear
Unto Vecellio's heart, palace of dreams,
Elysian dwelling-place of wraiths and fays;

O Calvi, may thy name with paurous might
Re-echo in both memory and desire,
And, in a passion of pale eagerness,

Youth's dauntless spirit rise and fly to arms!

Nay, not on Arcadian reeds, O Cadore, will I praise thee with murmur of zephyr and stream :

Heroic the strain I will sing to thy glory, like thunder of guns down below in the vale.

Second morning of May, on the edge of the roadway that traces the confine of Austria, see

Captain Calvi, while bullets are shrilling around and about him, springs upright, immobile and fair,

Upraising the treaty of Udine fixed to his sword-point and dauntlessly facing the foe,

With a kerchief of crimson, the signal for war and destruction, waving freely displayed in his left!

Pelmo a l'atto e Antelao da' bianchi nuvoli il capo grigio ne l'aere sciolgono,

come vecchi giganti che l' elmo chiomato scotendo a la battaglia guardano.

Come scudi d' eroi che splendon nel canto de' vati a lo stupor de i secoli,

raggianti nel candore, di contro al sol che pe 'l cielo sale, i ghiacciai scintillano.

Sol de le antiche glorie, con quanto ardore tu abbracci l' Alpi ed i fiumi e gli uomini !

tu fra le zolle sotto le nere boscaglie d'abeti visiti i morti e susciti.

"Nati su l'ossa nostre, ferite, figliuoli, ferite sopra l'eterno barbaro :

da' nevai che di sangue tingemmo crosciate, macigni, valanghe, stritolatelo!"

Tale da monte a monte rimbomba la voce de' morti che a Rusecco pugnarono;

e via di villa in villa con fremito ogn' ora crescente i venti la diffondono.

Afferran l' armi e a festa giovani tizïaneschi scendon cantando Italia :

stanno le donne a' neri veroni di legno fioriti di geranio e garofani.

Pieve che allegra siede tra' colli arridenti e del Piave ode basso lo strepito,

At the deed Antelao frees with Pelmo his hoary head, gently dispersing white clouds on the breeze;

Ancient giants they seem to be, shaking aloft crested helmets, intent on the battle below.

Like shields of the heroes ablaze in the song of the poets, to marvelling ages revealed,

In their virginal splendour the glaciers are shining, illumined by the sun climbing up through the sky.

O sun of the glories of old, with what ardour embracest the Alps and the rivers and men !

Thou seekest, wide-strewn o'er the sod, 'neath the shadowy fir-trees, the dead, and these raisest again :

"O ye who are born from these bones of ours, children, O children, the eternal barbarian smite :

From the snows that we drenched with our blood, avalanches pursue him,

and grind him to powder, O rocks!"

Thus the thunderous voice of the dead, they who fought at Ronsecco, from mountain to mountain is hurled,

And from hamlet to hamlet, each hour swelling louder and louder, afar on the wings of the wind.

And the children of Titian snatch weapons and, as upon feast-days, singing Italy's praises descend:

While their women lean over the dark-hued wood balconies, decked with

geraniums and pinks in full bloom.

Pieve, the gay, set among laughing hills, lending ear to

Piave's hoarse tumult below,

Auronzo bella al piano stendentesi lunga tra l'acque sotto la fósca Ajàrnola,

e Lorenzago aprica tra i campi declivi che d'alto la valle in mezzo domina,

e di borgate sparso nascose tra pini e gli abeti tutto il verde Comelico,

ed altre ville ed altre fra pascoli e selve ridenti i figli e i padri mandano:

fucili impugnan, lance brandiscono e roncole: i corni de i pastori rintronano.

Di tra gli altari viene l'antica bandiera che a Valle vide altra fuga austriaca,

e accoglie i prodi: al nuovo sol rugge e a' pericoli novi il vecchio leon veneto.

Udite. Un suon lontano discende, approssima, sale, corre, cresce, propagasi ;

un suon che piange e chiama, che grida, che prega, che infuria, insistente, terribile.

"Che è?" chiede il nemico venendo a l'abboccamento, e pur con gli occhi interroga.

Le campane

del popol d' Italia sono: a la morte

vostra o a la nostra suonano.”

Ahi, Pietro Calvi, al piano te poi fra sett' anni la morte da le fosse di Mantova

rapirà. Tu venisti cercandola, come a la sposa celatamente un esule.

Quale già d' Austria l' armi, tal d' Austria la forca or ei guarda sereno ed impassibile,

Auronzo, the fair, whom Ajárnola's gloom overshadows,

trailing over the well-watered plain,

Lorenzago, the sun-kissed, in meadows that slope from the summits, commanding the heart of the vale,

And over the verdant Comelico, with its sparse hamlets concealed between fir-trees and pines,

Other villages still, softly smiling in pastures and forests, bid their sons and their fathers depart :

They brandish the lance and the pruning-fork, shoulder the rifle, their pastoral horns sound again.

From the altar is taken the banner that witnessed at Vallé the Austrians routed of old,

And welcomes the brave; to new perils and to a new dawning the Ancient of Venice doth roar.

O hearken, a far-away sound nears, 'tis rising and falling and swelling and spreading abroad,

A sound as of wailing, of calling, vociferous, prayerful, insistent, of wrath and of dread:

"What is it?" the foeman demands as he reaches the parley, and his eyes crave an answer as well:

" "Tis a clamour of bells, 'tis the people of Italy tolling a knell for your death or our own! "

Peter Calvi, below on the plain, seven years hence, alas, destined to die in a Mantuan ditch,

Camest hither to woo death in secrecy, like to an exile who yearns to the arms of his bride!

As of yore on the weapons of Austria, he gazes serenely unmoved on her gibbet to-day;