A Guide to MythologyClarke, Helen A. (Helen Archibald)
General
A Guide to Mythology
Clarke, Helen A. (Helen Archibald)
Mythology -- Juvenile literature
1. I am wondering where I may gather some pretty, sweet flowers. Whom
shall I ask? Suppose that I ask the brilliant humming-bird, the emerald
trembler; suppose that I ask the yellow butterfly; they will tell me they
know where bloom the pretty, sweet flowers, whether I may get them here
in the laurel woods where dwell the tzinitzcan birds, or whether I may
gather them in the flowery forests where the thanquehol lives. There they
may be plucked sparkling with dew, there they come forth in perfection.
Perhaps there I shall see them if they have appeared; I shall place them
in the folds of my garment, and with them I shall greet the children, I
shall make glad the nobles.
2. Truly as I walk along I hear the rocks as it were replying to the
sweet songs of the flowers; truly the glittering, chattering water
answers; the bird-green fountain, there it sings, it dashes forth, it
sings again; the mocking-bird answers; perhaps the coyol bird answers;
and many sweet singing birds scatter their songs around like music. They
bless the earth, pouring out their sweet voices.
3. I said, I cried aloud: May I not cause you pain, ye beloved ones, who
are seated to listen; may the brilliant humming-birds come soon. Whom
do we seek, O noble poet? I ask, I say: Where are the pretty, fragrant
flowers with which I may make glad you, my noble compeers? Soon they will
sing to me: “Here we will make thee to see, thou singer, truly wherewith
thou shalt make glad the nobles, thy companions.”
4. They led me within a valley to a fertile spot, a flowery spot, where
the dew spread out in glittering splendor, where I saw various lovely
fragrant flowers, lovely odorous flowers, clothed with the dew, scattered
around in rainbow glory. There they said to me: “Pluck the flowers,
whichever thou wishest, mayest thou the singer be glad, and give them to
thy friends, to the nobles, that they may rejoice on the earth.”
5. So I gathered in the folds of my garment the various fragrant flowers,
delicate scented, delicious, and I said: May some of our people enter
here, may very many of us be here; and I thought I should go forth
to announce to our friends that here all of us should rejoice in the
different lovely, odorous flowers, and that we should cull the various
sweet songs with which we might rejoice our friends here on earth, and
the nobles in their grandeur and dignity.
6. So I, the singer, gathered all the flowers to place them upon the
nobles, to clothe them and put them in their hands, and soon I lifted
my voice in a worthy song glorifying the nobles before the face of the
Cause of All, where there is no servitude.
7. Where shall one pluck them? Where gather the sweet flowers? And how
shall I attain the flowery land, that fertile land, where there is no
servitude nor affliction? If one purchases it here on earth, it is only
through submission to the Cause of All; here on earth grief fills my soul
as I recall where I, the singer, saw the flowery spot.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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