C.D. Warner, et al., comp.
The Library of the World’s Best Literature. An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.
Ramón de Campoamor (1817–1901)
The Piper of Gijón
“N
But the piper, where is he?”
“He is burying his mother,
But he’ll be here presently.”—
“And will he come?”—What can he do?
See him now, to duty true,
With his pipes; but ah, how heavy
A heart he carries is only known
To the piper,
To the piper of Gijón!
A hearth awaits now his return,
Tears like molten lead his bosom,
In secret overflowing, burn.
But his brothers must be fed;
His the hands must earn their bread:
So his merry tunes, though joy
From his life for aye be gone,
Plays the piper,
Plays the piper of Gijón.
Mother held than his more dear;
And now the grave has closed above her,
Parting them forever here.
While he pipes his merry strain,
Sobs he seeks to still in vain
With it mingle, fierce and bitter,
Like the wounded lion’s groan.
Hapless piper!
Hapless piper of Gijón!
“Faster!” Faster still he plays;
Beneath a smiling face his anguish
To hide, though vainly, he essays.
And seeing him pipe gayly thus,
While flow his tears, as Zoïlus
Blind Homer once, some pitiless
Mock the aspect woebegone
Of the piper,
Of the piper of Gijón.
“Mother, mother, how a sigh
Relieves the breast with anguish laden,”
While he pipes on merrily;
For in his breast the voice he hears,
Now stilled in death, that on his ears
Fell sweetest, that shall ever echo
In the heart, a benison,
Of the piper,
Of the piper of Gijón.
Beneath a smiling countenance
His unshared agony, pipes gayly
That others to his strains may dance.
So does the poet with his song
Rejoice the world, while he among
Its merry masquers sits apart,
In spirit and in heart alone,
Like the piper,
Like the piper of Gijón.