Collected Poetical Works of Francesco Petrarch

by Francesco Petrarch

  Perceive ye not my whole heart in mine eyes?

  Well might I hope, save for my hostile skies,

  From mercy’s fount some pitying balm to flow.

  Yet this my flame which scarcely moves your care,

  And your warm praises sung in these fond rhymes,

  May thousands yet inflame in after times;

  These I foresee in fancy, my sweet fair,

  Though your bright eyes be closed and cold my breath,

  Shall lighten other loves and live in death.

  MACGREGOR.

  SONNET CLXXI.

  Anima, che diverse cose tante.

  HE REJOICES AT BEING ON EARTH WITH HER, AS HE IS THEREBY ENABLED BETTER TO IMITATE HER VIRTUES.

  Soul! with such various faculties endued

  To think, write, speak, to read, to see, to hear;

  My doting eyes! and thou, my faithful ear!

  Where drinks my heart her counsels wise and good;

  Your fortune smiles; if after or before,

  The path were won so badly follow’d yet,

  Ye had not then her bright eyes’ lustre met,

  Nor traced her light feet earth’s green carpet o’er.

  Now with so clear a light, so sure a sign,

  ‘Twere shame to err or halt on the brief way

  Which makes thee worthy of a home divine.

  That better course, my weary will, essay!

  To pierce the cloud of her sweet scorn be thine,

  Pursuing her pure steps and heavenly ray.

  MACGREGOR.

  SONNET CLXXII.

  Dolci ire, dolci sdegni e dolci paci.

  HE CONSOLES HIMSELF WITH THE THOUGHT THAT HE WILL BE ENVIED BY POSTERITY.

  Sweet scorn, sweet anger, and sweet misery,

  Forgiveness sweet, sweet burden, and sweet ill;

  Sweet accents that mine ear so sweetly thrill,

  That sweetly bland, now sweetly fierce can be.

  Mourn not, my soul, but suffer silently;

  And those embitter’d sweets thy cup that fill

  With the sweet honour blend of loving still

  Her whom I told: “Thou only pleasest me.”

  Hereafter, moved with envy, some may say:

  “For that high-boasted beauty of his day

  Enough the bard has borne!” then heave a sigh.

  Others: “Oh! why, most hostile Fortune, why

  Could not these eyes that lovely form survey?

  Why was she early born, or wherefore late was I?”

  NOTT.

  Sweet anger, sweet disdain, and peace as sweet,

  Sweet ill, sweet pain, sweet burthen that I bear,

  Sweet speech as sweetly heard; sweet speech, my fair!

  That now enflames my soul, now cools its heat.

  Patient, my soul! endure the wrongs you meet;

  And all th’ embitter’d sweets you’re doomed to share

  Blend with that sweetest bliss, the maid to greet

  In these soft words, “Thou only art my care!”

  Haply some youth shall sighing envious say,

  “Enough has borne the bard so fond, so true,

  For that bright beauty, brightest of his day!”

  While others cry, “Sad eyes! how hard your fate,

  Why could I ne’er this matchless beauty view?

  Why was she born so soon, or I so late?”

  ANON. 1777.

  CANZONE XIX.

  S’ il dissi mai, ch’ i’ venga in odio a quella.

  HE VEHEMENTLY REBUTS THE CHARGE OF LOVING ANOTHER.

  Perdie! I said it not,

  Nor never thought to do:

  As well as I, ye wot

  I have no power thereto.

  And if I did, the lot

  That first did me enchain

  May never slake the knot,

  But strait it to my pain.

  And if I did, each thing

  That may do harm or woe,

  Continually may wring

  My heart, where so I go!

  Report may always ring

  Of shame on me for aye,

  If in my heart did spring

  The words that you do say.

  And if I did, each star

  That is in heaven above,

  May frown on me, to mar

  The hope I have in love!

  And if I did, such war

  As they brought unto Troy,

  Bring all my life afar

  From all his lust and joy!

  And if I did so say,

  The beauty that me bound

  Increase from day to day,

  More cruel to my wound!

  With all the moan that may

  To plaint may turn my song;

  My life may soon decay,

  Without redress, by wrong!

  If I be clear from thought,

  Why do you then complain?

  Then is this thing but sought

  To turn my heart to pain.

  Then this that you have wrought,

  You must it now redress;

  Of right, therefore, you ought

  Such rigour to repress.

  And as I have deserved,

  So grant me now my hire;

  You know I never swerved,

  You never found me liar.

  For Rachel have I served,

  For Leah cared I never;

  And her I have reserved

  Within my heart for ever.

  WYATT.

  If I said so, may I be hated by

  Her on whose love I live, without which I should die —

  If I said so, my days be sad and short,

  May my false soul some vile dominion court.

  If I said so, may every star to me

  Be hostile; round me grow

  Pale fear and jealousy;

  And she, my foe,

  As cruel still and cold as fair she aye must be.

  If I said so, may Love upon my heart

  Expend his golden shafts, on her the leaden dart;

  Be heaven and earth, and God and man my foe,

  And she still more severe if I said so:

  If I said so, may he whose blind lights lead

  Me straightway to my grave,

  Trample yet worse his slave,

  Nor she behave

  Gentle and kind to me in look, or word, or deed.

  If I said so, then through my brief life may

  All that is hateful block my worthless weary way:

  If I said so, may the proud frost in thee

  Grow prouder as more fierce the fire in me:

  If I said so, no more then may the warm

  Sun or bright moon be view’d,

  Nor maid, nor matron’s form,

  But one dread storm

  Such as proud Pharaoh saw when Israel he pursued.

  If I said so, despite each contrite sigh,

  Let courtesy for me and kindly feeling die:

  If I said so, that voice to anger swell,

  Which was so sweet when first her slave I fell:

  If I said so, I should offend whom I,

  E’en from my earliest breath

  Until my day of death,

  Would gladly take,

  Alone in cloister’d cell my single saint to make.

  But if I said not so, may she who first,

  In life’s green youth, my heart to hope so sweetly nursed,

  Deign yet once more my weary bark to guide

  With native kindness o’er the troublous tide;

  And graceful, grateful, as her wont before,

  When, for I could no more,

  My all, myself I gave,

  To be her slave,

  Forget not the deep faith with which I still adore.

  I did not, could not, never would say so,

  For all that gold can give, cities or courts bestow:

  Let truth, then, take her old proud seat on high,

  And low on earth let baffled fals
ehood lie.

  Thou know’st me, Love! if aught my state within

  Belief or care may win,

  Tell her that I would call

  Him blest o’er all

  Who, doom’d like me to pine, dies ere his strife begin.

  Rachel I sought, not Leah, to secure,

  Nor could I this vain life with other fair endure,

  And, should from earth Heaven summon her again,

  Myself would gladly die

  For her, or with her, when

  Elijah’s fiery car her pure soul wafts on high.

  MACGREGOR.

  CANZONE XX.

  Ben mi credea passar mio tempo omai.

  HE CANNOT LIVE WITHOUT SEEING HER, BUT WOULD NOT DIE THAT HE MAY STILL LOVE HER.

  As pass’d the years which I have left behind,

  To pass my future years I fondly thought,

  Amid old studies, with desires the same;

  But, from my lady since I fail to find

  The accustom’d aid, the work himself has wrought

  Let Love regard my tempter who became;

  Yet scarce I feel the shame

  That, at my age, he makes me thus a thief

  Of that bewitching light

  For which my life is steep’d in cureless grief;

  In youth I better might

  Have ta’en the part which now I needs must take,

  For less dishonour boyish errors make.

  Those sweet eyes whence alone my life had health

  Were ever of their high and heavenly charms

  So kind to me when first my thrall begun,

  That, as a man whom not his proper wealth,

  But some extern yet secret succour arms,

  I lived, with them at ease, offending none:

  Me now their glances shun

  As one injurious and importunate,

  Who, poor and hungry, did

  Myself the very act, in better state

  Which I, in others, chid.

  From mercy thus if envy bar me, be

  My amorous thirst and helplessness my plea.

  In divers ways how often have I tried

  If, reft of these, aught mortal could retain

  E’en for a single day in life my frame:

  But, ah! my soul, which has no rest beside,

  Speeds back to those angelic lights again;

  And I, though but of wax, turn to their flame,

  Planting my mind’s best aim

  Where less the watch o’er what I love is sure:

  As birds i’ th’ wild wood green,

  Where less they fear, will sooner take the lure,

  So on her lovely mien,

  Now one and now another look I turn,

  Wherewith at once I nourish me and burn.

  Strange sustenance! upon my death I feed,

  And live in flames, a salamander rare!

  And yet no marvel, as from love it flows.

  A blithe lamb ‘mid the harass’d fleecy breed.

  Whilom I lay, whom now to worst despair

  Fortune and Love, as is their wont, expose.

  Winter with cold and snows,

  With violets and roses spring is rife,

  And thus if I obtain

  Some few poor aliments of else weak life,

  Who can of theft complain?

  So rich a fair should be content with this,

  Though others live on hers, if nought she miss.

  Who knows not what I am and still have been,

  From the first day I saw those beauteous eyes,

  Which alter’d of my life the natural mood?

  Traverse all lands, explore each sea between,

  Who can acquire all human qualities?

  There some on odours live by Ind’s vast flood;

  Here light and fire are food

  My frail and famish’d spirit to appease!

  Love! more or nought bestow;

  With lordly state low thrift but ill agrees;

  Thou hast thy darts and bow,

  Take with thy hands my not unwilling breath,

  Life were well closed with honourable death.

  Pent flames are strongest, and, if left to swell,

  Not long by any means can rest unknown,

  This own I, Love, and at your hands was taught.

  When I thus silent burn’d, you knew it well;

  Now e’en to me my cries are weary grown,

  Annoy to far and near so long that wrought.

  O false world! O vain thought!

  O my hard fate! where now to follow thee?

  Ah! from what meteor light

  Sprung in my heart the constant hope which she,

  Who, armour’d with your might,

  Drags me to death, binds o’er it as a chain?

  Yours is the fault, though mine the loss and pain.

  Thus bear I of true love the pains along,

  Asking forgiveness of another’s debt,

  And for mine own; whose eyes should rather shun

  That too great light, and to the siren’s song

  My ears be closed: though scarce can I regret

  That so sweet poison should my heart o’errun.

  Yet would that all were done,

  That who the first wound gave my last would deal;

  For, if I right divine,

  It were best mercy soon my fate to seal;

  Since not a chance is mine

  That he may treat me better than before,

  ’Tis well to die if death shut sorrow’s door.

  My song! with fearless feet

  The field I keep, for death in flight were shame.

  Myself I needs must blame

  For these laments; tears, sighs, and death to meet,

  Such fate for her is sweet.

  Own, slave of Love, whose eyes these rhymes may catch,

  Earth has no good that with my grief can match.

  MACGREGOR.

  SONNET CLXXIII.

  Rapido fiume che d’ alpestra vena.

  JOURNEYING ALONG THE RHONE TO AVIGNON, PETRARCH BIDS THE RIVER KISS LAURA’S HAND, AS IT WILL ARRIVE AT HER DWELLING BEFORE HIM.

  Impetuous flood, that from the Alps’ rude head,

  Eating around thee, dost thy name obtain;[V]

  Anxious like me both night and day to gain

  Where thee pure nature, and me love doth lead;

  Pour on: thy course nor sleep nor toils impede;

  Yet, ere thou pay’st thy tribute to the main,

  Oh, tarry where most verdant looks the plain,

  Where most serenity the skies doth spread!

  There beams my radiant sun of cheering ray,

  Which deck thy left banks, and gems o’er with flowers;

  E’en now, vain thought! perhaps she chides my stay:

  Kiss then her feet, her hand so beauteous fair;

  In place of language let thy kiss declare

  Strong is my will, though feeble are my powers.

  NOTT.

  O rapid flood! which from thy mountain bed

  Gnawest thy shores, whence (in my tongue) thy name;[V]

  Thou art my partner, night and day the same,

  Where I by love, thou art by nature led:

  Precede me now; no weariness doth shed

  Its spell o’er thee, no sleep thy course can tame;

  Yet ere the ocean waves thy tribute claim,

  Pause, where the herb and air seem brighter fed.

  There beams our sun of life, whose genial ray

  With brighter verdure thy left shore adorns;

  Perchance (vain hope!) e’en now my stay she mourns.

  Kiss then her foot, her lovely hand, and may

  Thy kiss to her in place of language speak,

  The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.

  WOLLASTON.

  SONNET CLXXIV.

  I’ dolci colli ov’ io lasciai me stesso.

  HE LEAVES VAUCLUSE, BUT HIS SPIRIT REMAINS THERE W
ITH LAURA.

  The loved hills where I left myself behind,

  Whence ever ’twas so hard my steps to tear,

  Before me rise; at each remove I bear

  The dear load to my lot by Love consign’d.

  Often I wonder inly in my mind,

  That still the fair yoke holds me, which despair

  Would vainly break, that yet I breathe this air;

  Though long the chain, its links but closer bind.

  And as a stag, sore struck by hunter’s dart,

  Whose poison’d iron rankles in his breast,

  Flies and more grieves the more the chase is press’d,

  So I, with Love’s keen arrow in my heart,

  Endure at once my death and my delight,

  Rack’d with long grief, and weary with vain flight.

  MACGREGOR.

  Those gentle hills which hold my spirit still

  (For though I fly, my heart there must remain),

  Are e’er before me, whilst my burthen’s pain,

  By love bestow’d, I bear with patient will.

  I marvel oft that I can yet fulfil

  That yoke’s sweet duties, which my soul enchain,

  I seek release, but find the effort vain;

  The more I fly, the nearer seems my ill.

  So, like the stag, who, wounded by the dart,

  Its poison’d iron rankling in his side,

  Flies swifter at each quickening anguish’d throb, —

  I feel the fatal arrow at my heart;

  Yet with its poison, joy awakes its tide;

  My flight exhausts me — grief my life doth rob!

  WOLLASTON.

  SONNET CLXXV.

  Non dall’ Ispano Ibero all’ Indo Idaspe.

  HIS WOES ARE UNEXAMPLED.

  From Spanish Ebro to Hydaspes old,

  Exploring ocean in its every nook,

  From the Red Sea to the cold Caspian shore,

  In earth, in heaven one only Phoenix dwells.

  What fortunate, or what disastrous bird

  Omen’d my fate? which Parca winds my yarn,

  That I alone find Pity deaf as asp,

  And wretched live who happy hoped to be?

  Let me not speak of her, but him her guide,

  Who all her heart with love and sweetness fills —

  Gifts which, from him o’erflowing, follow her,

  Who, that my sweets may sour and cruel be,

  Dissembleth, careth not, or will not see

  That silver’d, ere my time, these temples are.

  MACGREGOR.

  SONNET CLXXVI.

  Voglia mi sprona; Amor mi guida e scorge.