Translation of Dante's Inferno: Canto I, 1–12

I was practicing some Italian when I suddenly found myself reading some Dante. Off the easy path I had gone; But O!—How beautiful. I wished badly to convey the eloquence of his meter, but the translations I found were only pallid copies. The thought then came to me: that I would speak for to what I had witnessed, even if it means mixing it with my crude Italian. I was lost as if in a puzzle knowing not how I arrived nor how I might escape, when I left the comfort of my own language.

  Midway along this road we (all) liveth
I found myself (alone) at some dark wood,
The straight and narrow off I'd giveth          03
  Oh! I shan't d'scribe it even if I could
That wild forrest severe and spiteful
Just to think of it bringeth dread it would!    06
  Death itself could n'er be more frightful;
If I must account for the decency I found,
Obliged am I to speak of all, some unrightful   09
  I know not how I entered that dense ground,
So full of sleep then I don't remember
When I left the path of truth abound            12