The same note is struck in the following, which breathes the spirit of a
Penitential Psalm:[435]—­

CARICO D’ ANNI

    Burdened with years and full of sinfulness,
      With evil custom grown inveterate,
      Both deaths I dread that close before me wait,
    Yet feed my heart on poisonous thoughts no less. 
    No strength I find in mine own feebleness
      To change or life or love or use or fate,
      Unless Thy heavenly guidance come, though late,
    Which only helps and stays our nothingness.

    ’Tis not enough, dear Lord, to make me yearn
      For that celestial home, where yet my soul
      May be new made, and not, as erst, of nought: 
    Nay, ere Thou strip her mortal vestment, turn
      My steps toward the steep ascent, that whole
      And pure before Thy face she may be brought.

In reading the two next, we may remember that, at the end of his life, Michael Angelo was occupied with designs for a picture of the Crucifixion, which he never executed, though he gave a drawing of Christ upon the cross to Vittoria Colonna; and that his last work in marble was the unfinished “Pieta” in the Duomo at Florence.[436]

SCARCO D’ UN IMPORTUNA

    Freed from a burden sore and grievous band,
      Dear Lord, and from this wearying world untied,
      Like a frail bark I turn me to Thy side,
    As from a fierce storm to a tranquil land. 
    Thy thorns, Thy nails, and either bleeding hand,
      With Thy mild gentle piteous face, provide
      Promise of help and mercies multiplied,
    And hope that yet my soul secure may stand.

    Let not Thy holy eyes be just to see
      My evil past, Thy chastened ears to hear
      And stretch the arm of judgment to my crime: 
    Let Thy blood only lave and succour me,
      Yielding more perfect pardon, better cheer
      As older still I grow with lengthening time.

NON FUR MEN LIETI

    Not less elate than smitten with wild woe
      To see not them but Thee by death undone,
      Were those blest souls, when Thou above the sun
    Didst raise, by dying, men that lay so low: 
    Elate, since freedom from all ills that flow
      From their first fault for Adam’s race was won;
      Sore smitten, since in torment fierce God’s son
    Served servants on the cruel cross below.

    Heaven showed she knew Thee, who Thou wert and whence,
      Veiling her eyes above the riven earth;
      The mountains trembled and the seas were troubled: 
    He took the Fathers from hell’s darkness dense: 
      The torments of the damned fiends redoubled: 
      Man only joyed, who gained baptismal birth.

The collection of his poems is closed with yet another sonnet in the same lofty strain of prayer, and faith, and hope in God.[437]