Written by
Francesco Petrarch |
The eyes, the face, the limbs of heavenly mold,
So long the theme of my impassioned lay,
Charms which so stole me from myself away,
That strange to other men the course I hold;
The crisped locks of pure and lucid gold,
The lightning of the angelic smile, whose ray
To earth could all of paradise convey,
A little dust are now -- to feeling cold.
And yet I live -- but that I live bewail,
Sunk the loved light that through the tempest led
My shattered bark, bereft of mast and sail:
Hushed be for aye the song that breathed love's fire!
Lost is the theme on which my fancy fed,
And turned to mourning my once tuneful lyre.
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Written by
Francesco Petrarch |
SONNET VII. Occhi miei, oscurato è 'l nostro sole. HE ENDEAVOURS TO FIND PEACE IN THE THOUGHT THAT SHE IS IN HEAVEN. Mine eyes! our glorious sun is veil'd in night,Or set to us, to rise 'mid realms of love;There we may hail it still, and haply proveIt mourn'd that we delay'd our heavenward flight.Mine ears! the music of her tones delightThose, who its harmony can best approve;My feet! who in her track so joy'd to move.Ye cannot penetrate her regions bright!But wherefore should your wrath on me descend?No spell of mine hath hush'd for ye the joyOf seeing, hearing, feeling, she was near:Go, war with Death—yet, rather let us bendTo Him who can create—who can destroy—And bids the ready smile succeed the tear. Wollaston. O my sad eyes! our sun is overcast,—Nay, rather borne to heaven, and there is shining,Waiting our coming, and perchance repiningAt our delay; there shall we meet at last:And there, mine ears, her angel words float past,Those who best understand their sweet divining;Howe'er, my feet, unto the search inclining,Ye cannot reach her in those regions vast.Why, then, do ye torment me thus, for, oh!It is no fault of mine, that ye no more[Pg 242]Behold, and hear, and welcome her below;Blame Death,—or rather praise Him and adore,Who binds and frees, restrains and letteth go,And to the weeping one can joy restore. Wrottesley.
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Written by
Francesco Petrarch |
CANZONE II. Amor, se vuoi ch' i' torni al giogo antico. UNLESS LOVE CAN RESTORE HER TO LIFE, HE WILL NEVER AGAIN BE HIS SLAVE. If thou wouldst have me, Love, thy slave again,One other proof, miraculous and new,Must yet be wrought by you,Ere, conquer'd, I resume my ancient chain—Lift my dear love from earth which hides her now,For whose sad loss thus beggar'd I remain;Once more with warmth endowThat wise chaste heart where wont my life to dwell;And if as some divine, thy influence so,From highest heaven unto the depths of hell,Prevail in sooth—for what its scope below,'Mid us of common race,Methinks each gentle breast may answer well—Rob Death of his late triumph, and replaceThy conquering ensign in her lovely face! Relume on that fair brow the living light,Which was my honour'd guide, and the sweet flame.Though spent, which still the sameKindles me now as when it burn'd most bright;For thirsty hind with such desire did ne'erLong for green pastures or the crystal brook,As I for the dear look,Whence I have borne so much, and—if arightI read myself and passion—more must bear:This makes me to one theme my thoughts thus bind,An aimless wanderer where is pathway none,With weak and wearied mind[Pg 237]Pursuing hopes which never can be won.Hence to thy summons answer I disdain,Thine is no power beyond thy proper reign. Give me again that gentle voice to hear,As in my heart are heard its echoes still,Which had in song the skillHate to disarm, rage soften, sorrow cheer,To tranquillize each tempest of the mind,And from dark lowering clouds to keep it clear;Which sweetly then refinedAnd raised my verse where now it may not soar.And, with desire that hope may equal vie,Since now my mind is waked in strength, restoreTheir proper business to my ear and eye,Awanting which life mustAll tasteless be and harder than to die.Vainly with me to your old power you trust,While my first love is shrouded still in dust. Give her dear glance again to bless my sight,Which, as the sun on snow, beam'd still for me;Open each window brightWhere pass'd my heart whence no return can be;Resume thy golden shafts, prepare thy bow,And let me once more drink with old delightOf that dear voice the sound,Whence what love is I first was taught to know.And, for the lures, which still I covet so,Were rifest, richest there my soul that bound,Waken to life her tongue, and on the breezeLet her light silken hair,Loosen'd by Love's own fingers, float at ease;Do this, and I thy willing yoke will bear,Else thy hope faileth my free will to snare. Oh! never my gone heart those links of gold,Artlessly negligent, or curl'd with grace,Nor her enchanting face,Sweetly severe, can captive cease to hold;These, night and day, the amorous wish in meKept, more than laurel or than myrtle, green,When, doff'd or donn'd, we seeOf fields the grass, of woods their leafy screen.[Pg 238]And since that Death so haughty stands and sternThe bond now broken whence I fear'd to flee,Nor thine the art, howe'er the world may turn,To bind anew the chain,What boots it, Love, old arts to try again?Their day is pass'd: thy power, since lost the armsWhich were my terror once, no longer harms. Thy arms were then her eyes, unrivall'd, whenceLive darts were freely shot of viewless flame;No help from reason came,For against Heaven avails not man's defence;Thought, Silence, Feeling, Gaiety, Wit, Sense,Modest demeanour, affable discourse,In words of sweetest forceWhence every grosser nature gentle grew,That angel air, humble to all and kind,Whose praise, it needs not mine, from all we find;Stood she, or sat, a grace which often threwDoubt on the gazer's mindTo which the meed of highest praise was due—O'er hardest hearts thy victory was sure,With arms like these, which lost I am secure. The minds which Heaven abandons to thy reign,Haply are bound in many times and ways,But mine one only chain,Its wisdom shielding me from more, obeys;Yet freedom brings no joy, though that he burst.Rather I mournful ask, "Sweet pilgrim mine,Alas! what doom divineMe earliest bound to life yet frees thee first:God, who has snatch'd thee from the world so soon,Only to kindle our desires, the boonOf virtue, so complete and lofty, gaveNow, Love, I may derideThy future wounds, nor fear to be thy slave;In vain thy bow is bent, its bolts fall wide,When closed her brilliant eyes their virtue died. "Death from thy every law my heart has freed;She who my lady was is pass'd on high,Leaving me free to count dull hours drag by,To solitude and sorrow still decreed." Macgregor.
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Written by
Francesco Petrarch |
SONNET CLIX. Stiamo, Amor, a veder la gloria nostra. TO LOVE, ON LAURA WALKING ABROAD. Here stand we, Love, our glory to behold—How, passing Nature, lovely, high, and rare!Behold! what showers of sweetness falling there!What floods of light by heaven to earth unroll'd!How shine her robes, in purple, pearls, and gold,So richly wrought, with skill beyond compare!How glance her feet!—her beaming eyes how fairThrough the dark cloister which these hills enfold!The verdant turf, and flowers of thousand huesBeneath yon oak's old canopy of state,Spring round her feet to pay their amorous duty.The heavens, in joyful reverence, cannot chooseBut light up all their fires, to celebrateHer praise, whose presence charms their awful beauty. Merivale. Here tarry, Love, our glory to behold;Nought in creation so sublime we trace;Ah! see what sweetness showers upon that face,Heaven's brightness to this earth those eyes unfold!See, with what magic art, pearls, purple, gold,That form transcendant, unexampled, grace:Beneath the shadowing hills observe her pace,Her glance replete with elegance untold!The verdant turf, and flowers of every hue,Clustering beneath yon aged holm-oak's gloom,For the sweet pressure of her fair feet sue;The orbs of fire that stud yon beauteous sky,Cheer'd by her presence and her smiles, assumeSuperior lustre and serenity. Nott.
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Written by
Francesco Petrarch |
SESTINA I. Mia benigna fortuna e 'l viver lieto. IN HIS MISERY HE DESIRES DEATH THE MORE HE REMEMBERS HIS PAST CONTENTMENT AND COMFORT. My favouring fortune and my life of joy,My days so cloudless, and my tranquil nights,The tender sigh, the pleasing power of song,Which gently wont to sound in verse and rhyme,[Pg 289]Suddenly darken'd into grief and tears,Make me hate life and inly pray for death! O cruel, grim, inexorable Death!How hast thou dried my every source of joy,And left me to drag on a life of tears,Through darkling days and melancholy nights.My heavy sighs no longer meet in rhyme,And my hard martyrdom exceeds all song! Where now is vanish'd my once amorous song?To talk of anger and to treat with death;Where the fond verses, where the happy rhymeWelcomed by gentle hearts with pensive joy?Where now Love's communings that cheer'd my nights?My sole theme, my one thought, is now but tears! Erewhile to my desire so sweet were tearsTheir tenderness refined my else rude song,And made me wake and watch the livelong nights;But sorrow now to me is worse than death,Since lost for aye that look of modest joy,The lofty subject of my lowly rhyme! Love in those bright eyes to my ready rhymeGave a fair theme, now changed, alas! to tears;With grief remembering that time of joy,My changed thoughts issue find in other song,Evermore thee beseeching, pallid Death,To snatch and save me from these painful nights! Sleep has departed from my anguish'd nights,Music is absent from my rugged rhyme,Which knows not now to sound of aught but death;Its notes, so thrilling once, all turn'd to tears,Love knows not in his reign such varied song,As full of sadness now as then of joy! Man lived not then so crown'd as I with joy,Man lives not now such wretched days and nights;And my full festering grief but swells the songWhich from my bosom draws the mournful rhyme;I lived in hope, who now live but in tears,Nor against death have other hope save death! [Pg 290]Me Death in her has kill'd; and only DeathCan to my sight restore that face of joy,Which pleasant made to me e'en sighs and tears,Balmy the air, and dewy soft the nights,Wherein my choicest thoughts I gave to rhymeWhile Love inspirited my feeble song! Would that such power as erst graced Orpheus' songWere mine to win my Laura back from death,As he Eurydice without a rhyme;Then would I live in best excess of joy;Or, that denied me, soon may some sad nightClose for me ever these twin founts of tears! Love! I have told with late and early tears,My grievous injuries in doleful song;Not that I hope from thee less cruel nights;And therefore am I urged to pray for death,Which hence would take me but to crown with joy,Where lives she whom I sing in this sad rhyme! If so high may aspire my weary rhyme,To her now shelter'd safe from rage and tears,Whose beauties fill e'en heaven with livelier joy,Well would she recognise my alter'd song,Which haply pleased her once, ere yet by deathHer days were cloudless made and dark my nights! O ye, who fondly sigh for better nights,Who listen to love's will, or sing in rhyme,Pray that for me be no delay in death,The port of misery, the goal of tears,But let him change for me his ancient song,Since what makes others sad fills me with joy! Ay! for such joy, in one or in few nights,I pray in rude song and in anguish'd rhyme,That soon my tears may ended be in death!
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Written by
Francesco Petrarch |
[Pg 322] PETRARCH'S TRIUMPHS.
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Written by
Francesco Petrarch |
SONNET XII. Mai non fu' in parte ove sì chiar' vedessi. VAUCLUSE. Nowhere before could I so well have seenHer whom my soul most craves since lost to view;Nowhere in so great freedom could have beenBreathing my amorous lays 'neath skies so blue;Never with depths of shade so calm and greenA valley found for lover's sigh more true;[Pg 245]Methinks a spot so lovely and sereneLove not in Cyprus nor in Gnidos knew.All breathes one spell, all prompts and prays that ILike them should love—the clear sky, the calm hour,Winds, waters, birds, the green bough, the gay flower—But thou, beloved, who call'st me from on high,By the sad memory of thine early fate,Pray that I hold the world and these sweet snares in hate. Macgregor. Never till now so clearly have I seenHer whom my eyes desire, my soul still views;Never enjoy'd a freedom thus serene;Ne'er thus to heaven breathed my enamour'd muse,As in this vale sequester'd, darkly green;Where my soothed heart its pensive thought pursues,And nought intrusively may intervene,And all my sweetly-tender sighs renews.To Love and meditation, faithful shade,Receive the breathings of my grateful breast!Love not in Cyprus found so sweet a nestAs this, by pine and arching laurel made!The birds, breeze, water, branches, whisper love;Herb, flower, and verdant path the lay symphonious move. Capel Lofft.
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Written by
Francesco Petrarch |
SONNET VII. La gola e 'l sonno e l' oziose piume. TO A FRIEND, ENCOURAGING HIM TO PURSUE POETRY. Torn is each virtue from its earthly throneBy sloth, intemperance, and voluptuous ease;E'en nature deviates from her wonted ways,Too much the slave of vicious custom grown.Far hence is every light celestial gone,That guides mankind through life's perplexing maze;And those, whom Helicon's sweet waters please,From mocking crowds receive contempt alone.Who now would laurel, myrtle-wreaths obtain?Let want, let shame, Philosophy attend!Cries the base world, intent on sordid gain.[Pg 7]What though thy favourite path be trod by few;Let it but urge thee more, dear gentle friend!Thy great design of glory to pursue. Anon. Intemperance, slumber, and the slothful downHave chased each virtue from this world away;Hence is our nature nearly led astrayFrom its due course, by habitude o'erthrown;Those kindly lights of heaven so dim are grown,Which shed o'er human life instruction's ray;That him with scornful wonder they survey,Who would draw forth the stream of Helicon."Whom doth the laurel please, or myrtle now?Naked and poor, Philosophy, art thou!"The worthless crowd, intent on lucre, cries.Few on thy chosen road will thee attend;Yet let it more incite thee, gentle friend,To prosecute thy high-conceived emprize. Nott.
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Written by
Francesco Petrarch |
SONNET CXCVII. Qual ventura mi fu, quando dall' uno. HE REJOICES AT PARTICIPATING IN HER SUFFERINGS. Strange, passing strange adventure! when from oneOf the two brightest eyes which ever were,Beholding it with pain dis urb'd and dim,Moved influence which my own made dull and weak.I had return'd, to break the weary fastOf seeing her, my sole care in this world,Kinder to me were Heaven and Love than e'enIf all their other gifts together join'd,When from the right eye—rather the right sun—Of my dear Lady to my right eye cameThe ill which less my pain than pleasure makes;As if it intellect possess'd and wingsIt pass'd, as stars that shoot along the sky:Nature and pity then pursued their course. Anon.
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Written by
Francesco Petrarch |
SONNET XII. Quando fra l' altre donne ad ora ad ora. THE BEAUTY OF LAURA LEADS HIM TO THE CONTEMPLATION OF THE SUPREME GOOD. Throned on her angel brow, when Love displaysHis radiant form among all other fair,Far as eclipsed their choicest charms appear,I feel beyond its wont my passion blaze.And still I bless the day, the hour, the place,When first so high mine eyes I dared to rear;And say, "Fond heart, thy gratitude declare,That then thou had'st the privilege to gaze.'Twas she inspired the tender thought of love,Which points to heaven, and teaches to despiseThe earthly vanities that others prize:She gave the soul's light grace, which to the skiesBids thee straight onward in the right path move;Whence buoy'd by hope e'en, now I soar to worlds above." Wrangham. [Pg 12] When Love, whose proper throne is that sweet face,At times escorts her 'mid the sisters fair,As their each beauty is than hers less rare,So swells in me the fond desire apace.I bless the hour, the season and the place,So high and heavenward when my eyes could dare;And say: "My heart! in grateful memory bearThis lofty honour and surpassing grace:From her descends the tender truthful thought,Which follow'd, bliss supreme shall thee repay,Who spurn'st the vanities that win the crowd:From her that gentle graceful love is caught,To heaven which leads thee by the right-hand way,And crowns e'en here with hopes both pure and proud." Macgregor.
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