Through me you go into a city of weeping;
Through me you go into eternal pain;
Through me you go among the lost people.
Justice moved my high maker;
Divine power made me,
Highest wisdom and primal love.
Before me were no created things,
Only eternals, and I eternal last.
Abandon all hope, you who enter here.
These words, dark in color,
I saw written at the top of a gate;
Whence I: Master, their meaning is hard to me.
And he to me, as one experienced:
Here all suspicion must be left behind;
All cowardice must be extinguished.
We have come to the place where I told you
You would see the wretched people
Who have lost the good of the intellect.
And placing his hand on mine
With a cheerful look that gave me comfort,
He led me into the secret things.
There sighs, complaints, and wails resounded
Through the starless air,
So that I too began to weep.
Strange languages, horrible accents,
Words of pain, tones of anger,
Voices high and hoarse, with sounds of hands,
Made a tumult that circles forever
In that air, always dark,
Like the sand when the whirlwind blows.