O, Juliet by Robin Maxwell Read Free Book Online Page B

opened a small volume I took to be Vita Nuova , turning to a page marked with a ribbon. “The subject is death.”
    The jovial murmurings of the crowd were silenced as all attended the cleric’s words.
    “Have we not—every one of us—suffered at the cruel hand of the Reaper?”
    There were numerous utterings from the assembled, agreement and consensus.
    “Dante, himself, suffered a most wrenching loss with the death of his Beatrice. The poet wrote”—the friar read now—“ ‘So much grief had become the destroyer of my soul.’ He was a man who,” he quoted, “ ‘ died a death of tears .’ ”
    The gentleman beside me nodded with deep understanding.
    “He was so bereft he became ‘ jealous of whosoever dies ,’” Bartolomo went on. “And yet, my friends, Dante Alighieri, torn apart by grief, gave us instruction in graceful acceptance of loss. In the depths of his misery he writes of seeing Beatrice’s ladies covering her head with a white veil and it seemed that his deceased lover’s face was—listen to these words—‘ so filled with joyous acceptance that it said to me: I am contemplating the fountainhead of peace .’” Friar Bartolomo looked up and smiled beatifically at his students.“Death is a ‘ fountainhead of peace .’ Can we not all take comfort in that image?”
    From everywhere I heard men calling, “Yes, yes.”
    The teacher found another ribboned page. “His Beatrice, he said, ‘ has ascended to high heaven into a realm where angels live in peace .’”
    A long sigh was heard behind me.
    “ ‘Her tender soul, perfectly filled with grace, now lives with glory in a worthy place.”
    A man in front of me put his face in his hands and wept unabashedly.
    Bartolomo went on.
    The pleasure of her beauty,
having removed itself from mortal sight,
was transformed into beauty of the soul
spreading throughout the heavens....
    He looked up. “ ‘This lady had become a citizen of eternal life.’”
    Suddenly a voice from the choir rail a few feet before me called out, “Good friar, why of all his subjects in a book Dante titled New Life do you choose to speak only of a lady’s death?”
    My heart leapt nearly from my chest.
    It was Romeo.
    That deep, melodious voice had come to be familiar to me in one short meeting. I twisted sharply to see him, but then many did the same, for they wished to know the face of the man who spoke out so boldly in the friar’s symposium.
    And there he was! My Romeo dressed in a short blue tunic with wide flowing sleeves.
    “Why not speak of love?” he persisted. “ ‘Joyous love.’ What our maestro called ‘ the very summit of bliss .’ ”
    “Only because, young sir,” the friar answered mildly, “my chosen topic was death.”
    “But perhaps the good people of Florence have had enough of death. They might prefer a happier topic.” Romeo looked around at the assembled.
    Everyone was silent, unused—it appeared—to one of their ranks defying their teacher.
    “Are there none here that are”—and Romeo quoted—“ ‘utterly consumed for the sake of a lady’ ? Who ‘travel on the road of love’ ?”
    I felt a gush of words unbidden, yet unstoppable, burst from my throat. “Here is one ‘on the road of sighs’ who is calling, ‘Love, help your faithful one’ ! ”
    Romeo turned to find me. He was beaming and triumphant. Our eyes met and held.
    A horrified Lucrezia whispered, “Juliet . . .”
    But now the congregation, shocked that a young, unmarried lady was here and, even more so, that the lady had spoken and knew Dante so well, was all agog. Excitement rippled the room. And grumbling, too.
    But I had grown very bold and asked the friar, “Did not Dante write in the vernacular so his words might be understood by ladies who found Latin verses difficult to comprehend?”
    “Yes, that is true,” Bartolomo said.
    But this audience of men was not at all happy. They began to talk loudly among themselves.
    “Let her speak!” Romeo