Look And Pass Them By

Here sighs and cries
and shrieks of lamentation
echoed throughout
the starless air of Hell.
At first these sounds
resounding made me weep:
tongues confused,
a language strained in anguish
with cadences of anger,
shrill outcries and raucous groans
that joined with sounds of hands,
raising a whirling storm
that turns itself forever through
that air of endless black,
like grains of sand
swirling when a whirlwind blows.
And I, in the midst of
all this circling horror,
began, "Teacher,
what are these sounds I hear?
What souls are these
so overwhelmed by grief?"

And he to me:
"This wretched state of being
is the fate of those sad souls
who lived a life
but lived it with no blame
and with no praise.
They are mixed with that
repulsive choir of angels
neither faithful nor unfaithful
to their God, who undecided
stood but for themselves.
Heaven, to keep its beauty,
cast them out, but even
Hell itself would not receive them,
for fear the damned
might glory over them."

And I: "Master, what torments
do they suffer that force them
to lament so bitterly?"
He answered:
"I will tell you in few words:
these wretches have
no hope of truly dying,
and this blind life they lead
is so abject it makes them
envy every other fate.
The world will not record
their having been there.
Heaven's mercy and
its justice turn from them.
Let's not discuss them.
Look and pass them by..."
--Dante Alighieri

Hermit Rapid
sidecanyon reflection
below Royal Arch
Seventy-five Mile Canyon
Vishnu Temple