Sonnet CXXXIII
SONNET CXXXIII.
S' io fossi stato fermo alla spelunca.
TO ONE WHO DESIRED LATIN VERSE OF HIM.
Still had I sojourn'd in that Delphic caveWhere young Apollo prophet first became,Verona, Mantua were not sole in fame,But Florence, too, her poet now might have:But since the waters of that spring no moreEnrich my land, needs must that I pursue[Pg 158]Some other planet, and, with sickle new,Reap from my field of sticks and thorns its store.Dried is the olive: elsewhere turn'd the streamWhose source from famed Parnassus was derived.Whereby of yore it throve in best esteem.Me fortune thus, or fault perchance, deprivedOf all good fruit—unless eternal JoveShower on my head some favour from above.