FROM THE SAME
Advice Addressed to Captain Diego
Alatriste
SONNET
If what I have I do not fear to lose,
Nor yet desire to have what I do not,
I’m safe from Fortune’s wheel whate’er I
choose,
Let plaintiff or defendant be my lot.
For if I joy not in another’s pain
And worldly wealth brings me no hint of
pleasure,
Grim death may come and take me without
strain;
I’ll not resist or ask for lesser measure.
And you, who even now know not the chains
With which this age imprisons a heart,
Diego—free from pleasures and from pains—
Keep, thus, far hence the prick of passion’s
dart;
So to the last, dear Alatriste, keep
Alone, alone, until the final sleep.