Time by Luís de Camões translated by William Baer Time changes, and our desires change. What we believe—even what we are—is ever- changing. The world is change, which forever takes on new qualities. And constantly, we see the new and the novel overturning the past, unexpectedly, while we retain from evil, nothing but its terrible pain, from good (if there's been any), only the yearning. Time covers the ground with her cloak of green where, once, there was freezing snow—and rearranges my sweetest songs to sad laments. Yet even more astonishing is yet another unseen change within all these endless changes: that for me, nothing ever changes anymore.
From Selected Sonnets: A Bilingual Edition by Luís de Camões, translated by William Baer (University of Chicago Press, 2005).