Collected Poetical Works of Francesco Petrarch

by Francesco Petrarch

Whom death a little earlier had made glad.

  In those bright eyes, where wont my heart to dwell,

  Until by envy my hard fortune stirr’d

  Rose from so rich a temple to expel,

  Love with his proper hand had character’d

  In lines of pity what, ere long, I ween

  The issue of my old desire had been.

  Dying alone, and not my life with me,

  Comely and sweet it then had been to die,

  Leaving my life’s best part unscathed and free;

  But now my fond hopes lie

  Dead in her silent dust: a secret chill

  Shoots through me when I think that I live still.

  If my poor intellect had but the force

  To help my need, and if no other lure

  Had led it from the plain and proper course,

  Upon my lady’s brow ‘twere easy sure

  To have read this truth, “Here all thy pleasure dies,

  And hence thy lifelong trial dates its rise.”

  My spirit then had gently pass’d away

  In her dear presence from all mortal care;

  Freed from this troublesome and heavy clay,

  Mounting, before her, where

  Angels and saints prepared on high her place,

  Whom I but follow now with slow sad pace.

  My song! if one there be

  Who in his love finds happiness and rest,

  Tell him this truth from me,

  “Die, while thou still art bless’d,

  For death betimes is comfort, not dismay,

  And who can rightly die needs no delay.”

  MACGREGOR.

  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,

  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 rhyme

  Welcomed 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 tears

  Their 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 rhyme

  Gave 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 song

  Which 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!

  Me Death in her has kill’d; and only Death

  Can 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 rhyme

  While Love inspirited my feeble song!

  Would that such power as erst graced Orpheus’ song

  Were 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 night

  Close 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 death

  Her 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!

  MACGREGOR.

  SONNET LX.

  Ite, rime dolenti, al duro sasso.

  HE PRAYS THAT SHE WILL BE NEAR HIM AT HIS DEATH, WHICH HE FEELS APPROACHING.

  Go, plaintive verse, to the cold marble go,

  Which hides in earth my treasure from these eyes;

  There call on her who answers from yon skies,

  Although the mortal part dwells dark and low.

  Of life how I am wearied make her know,

  Of stemming these dread waves that round me rise:

  But, copying all her virtues I so prize,

  Her track I follow, yet my steps are slow.

  I sing of her, living, or dead, alone;

  (Dead, did I say? She is immortal made!)

  That by the world she should be loved, and known.

  Oh! in my passage hence may she be near,

  To greet my coming that’s not long delay’d;

  And may I hold in heaven the rank herself holds there!

  NOTT.

  Go, melancholy rhymes! your tribute bring

  To that cold stone, which holds the dear remains

  Of all that earth held precious; — uttering,

  If heaven should deign to hear them, earthly strains.

  Tell her, that sport of tempests, fit no more

  To stem the troublous ocean, — here at last

  Her votary treads the solitary shore;

  His only pleasure to recall the past.

  Tell her, that she who living ruled his fate,

  In death still holds her empire: all his care,

  So grant the Muse her aid, — to celebrate

  Her every word, and thought, and action fair.

  Be this my meed, that in the hour of death

  Her kindred spirit may hail, and bless my parting breath!

  WOODHOUSELEE.

  SONNET LXI.

  S’ onesto amor può meritar mercede.

  HE P
RAYS THAT, IN REWARD FOR HIS LONG AND VIRTUOUS ATTACHMENT, SHE WILL VISIT HIM IN DEATH.

  If Mercy e’er rewardeth virtuous love,

  If Pity still can do, as she has done,

  I shall have rest, for clearer than the sun

  My lady and the world my faith approve.

  Who fear’d me once, now knows, yet scarce believes

  I am the same who wont her love to seek,

  Who seek it still; where she but heard me speak,

  Or saw my face, she now my soul perceives.

  Wherefore I hope that e’en in heaven she mourns

  My heavy anguish, and on me the while

  Her sweet face eloquent of pity turns,

  And that when shuffled off this mortal coil,

  Her way to me with that fair band she’ll wend,

  True follower of Christ and virtue’s friend.

  MACGREGOR.

  If virtuous love doth merit recompense —

  If pity still maintain its wonted sway —

  I that reward shall win, for bright as day

  To earth and Laura breathes my faith’s incense.

  She fear’d me once — now heavenly confidence

  Reveals my heart’s first hope’s unchanging stay;

  A word, a look, could this alone convey,

  My heart she reads now, stripp’d of earth’s defence.

  And thus I hope, she for my heavy sighs

  To heaven complains, to me she pity shows

  By sympathetic visits in my dream:

  And when this mortal temple breathless lies,

  Oh! may she greet my soul, enclosed by those

  Whom heaven and virtue love — our friends supreme.

  WOLLASTON.

  SONNET LXII.

  Vidi fra mille donne una già tale.

  BEAUTY SHOWED ITSELF IN, AND DISAPPEARED WITH, LAURA.

  ‘Mid many fair one such by me was seen

  That amorous fears my heart did instant seize,

  Beholding her — nor false the images —

  Equal to angels in her heavenly mien.

  Nothing in her was mortal or terrene,

  As one whom nothing short of heaven can please;

  My soul well train’d for her to burn and freeze

  Sought in her wake to mount the blue serene.

  But ah! too high for earthly wings to rise

  Her pitch, and soon she wholly pass’d from sight:

  The very thought still makes me cold and numb;

  O beautiful and high and lustrous eyes,

  Where Death, who fills the world with grief and fright,

  Found entrance in so fair a form to come.

  MACGREGOR.

  SONNET LXIII.

  Tornami a mente, anzi v’ è dentro quella.

  SHE IS SO FIXED IN HIS HEART THAT AT TIMES HE BELIEVES HER STILL ALIVE,

  AND IS FORCED TO RECALL THE DATE OF HER DEATH.

  Oh! to my soul for ever she returns;

  Or rather Lethe could not blot her thence,

  Such as she was when first she struck my sense,

  In that bright blushing age when beauty burns:

  So still I see her, bashful as she turns

  Retired into herself, as from offence:

  I cry—”’Tis she! she still has life and sense:

  Oh, speak to me, my love!” — Sometimes she spurns

  My call; sometimes she seems to answer straight:

  Then, starting from my waking dream, I say, —

  “Alas! poor wretch, thou art of mind bereft!

  Forget’st thou the first hour of the sixth day

  Of April, the three hundred, forty eight,

  And thousandth year, — when she her earthly mansion left?”

  MOREHEAD.

  My mind recalls her; nay, her home is there,

  Nor can Lethean draught drive thence her form,

  I see that star’s pure ray her spirit warm,

  Whose grace and spring-time beauty she doth wear.

  As thus my vision paints her charms so rare,

  That none to such perfection may conform,

  I cry, “’Tis she! death doth to life transform!”

  And then to hear that voice, I wake my prayer.

  She now replies, and now doth mute appear,

  Like one whose tottering mind regains its power;

  I speak my heart: “Thou must this cheat resign;

  The thirteen hundred, eight and fortieth year,

  The sixth of April’s suns, his first bright hour,

  Thou know’st that soul celestial fled its shrine!”

  WOLLASTON.

  SONNET LXIV.

  Questo nostro caduco e fragil bene.

  NATURE DISPLAYED IN HER EVERY CHARM, BUT SOON WITHDREW HER FROM SIGHT.

  This gift of beauty which a good men name,

  Frail, fleeting, fancied, false, a wind, a shade,

  Ne’er yet with all its spells one fair array’d,

  Save in this age when for my cost it came.

  Not such is Nature’s duty, nor her aim,

  One to enrich if others poor are made,

  But now on one is all her wealth display’d,

  — Ladies, your pardon let my boldness claim.

  Like loveliness ne’er lived, or old or new,

  Nor ever shall, I ween, but hid so strange,

  Scarce did our erring world its marvel view,

  So soon it fled; thus too my soul must change

  The little light vouchsafed me from the skies

  Only for pleasure of her sainted eyes.

  MACGREGOR.

  SONNET LXV.

  O tempo, o ciel volubil che fuggendo.

  HE NO LONGER CONTEMPLATES THE MORTAL, BUT THE IMMORTAL BEAUTIES OF LAURA.

  O Time! O heavens! whose flying changes frame

  Errors and snares for mortals poor and blind;

  O days more swift than arrows or the wind,

  Experienced now, I know your treacherous aim.

  You I excuse, myself alone I blame,

  For Nature for your flight who wings design’d

  To me gave eyes which still I have inclined

  To mine own ill, whence follow grief and shame.

  An hour will come, haply e’en now is pass’d,

  Their sight to turn on my diviner part

  And so this infinite anguish end at last.

  Rejects not your long yoke, O Love, my heart,

  But its own ill by study, sufferings vast:

  Virtue is not of chance, but painful art.

  MACGREGOR.

  O Time! O circling heavens! in your flight

  Us mortals ye deceive — so poor and blind;

  O days! more fleeting than the shaft or wind,

  Experience brings your treachery to my sight!

  But mine the error — ye yourselves are right;

  Your flight fulfils but that your wings design’d:

  My eyes were Nature’s gift, yet ne’er could find

  But one blest light — and hence their present blight.

  It now is time (perchance the hour is pass’d)

  That they a safer dwelling should select,

  And thus repose might soothe my grief acute:

  Love’s yoke the spirit may not from it cast,

  (With oh what pain!) it may its ill eject;

  But virtue is attain’d but by pursuit!

  WOLLASTON.

  SONNET LXVI.

  Quel, che d’ odore e di color vincea.

  THE LAUREL, IN WHOM HE PLACED ALL HIS JOY HAS BEEN TAKEN FROM HIM TO ADORN HEAVEN.

  That which in fragrance and in hue defied

  The odoriferous and lucid East,

  Fruits, flowers and herbs and leaves, and whence the West

  Of all rare excellence obtain’d the prize,

  My laurel sweet, which every beauty graced,

  Where every glowing virtue loved to dwell,

  Beheld beneath its fair and friendly shade

 
My Lord, and by his side my Goddess sit.

  Still have I placed in that beloved plant

  My home of choicest thoughts: in fire, in frost

  Shivering or burning, still I have been bless’d.

  The world was of her perfect honours full

  When God, his own bright heaven therewith to grace,

  Reclaim’d her for Himself, for she was his.

  MACGREGOR.

  SONNET LXVII.

  Lasciato hai, Morte, senza sole il mondo.

  HER TRUE WORTH WAS KNOWN ONLY TO HIM AND TO HEAVEN.

  Death, thou the world, since that dire arrow sped,

  Sunless and cold hast left; Love weak and blind;

  Beauty and grace their brilliance have resign’d,

  And from my heavy heart all joy is fled;

  Honour is sunk, and softness banishèd.

  I weep alone the woes which all my kind

  Should weep — for virtue’s fairest flower has pined

  Beneath thy touch: what second blooms instead?

  Let earth, sea, air, with common wail bemoan

  Man’s hapless race; which now, since Laura died,

  A flowerless mead, a gemless ring appears.

  The world possess’d, nor knew her worth, till flown!

  I knew it well, who here in grief abide;

  And heaven too knows, which decks its forehead with my tears.

  WRANGHAM.

  Thou, Death, hast left this world’s dark cheerless way

  Without a sun: Love blind and stripp’d of arms;

  Left mirth despoil’d; beauty bereaved of charms;

  And me self-wearied, to myself a prey;

  Left vanish’d, sunk, whate’er was courteous, gay:

  I only weep, yet all must feel alarms:

  If beauty’s bud the hand of rapine harms

  It dies, and not a second views the day!

  Let air, earth, ocean weep for human kind;

  For human kind, deprived of Laura, seems

  A flowerless mead, a ring whose gem is lost.

  None knew her worth while to this orb confined,

  Save me her bard, whose sorrow ceaseless streams,

  And heaven, that’s made more beauteous at my cost.

  NOTT.

  SONNET LXVIII.

  Conobbi, quanto il ciel gli occhi m’ aperse.

  HER PRAISES ARE, COMPARED WITH HER DESERTS, BUT AS A DROP TO THE OCEAN.

  So far as to mine eyes its light heaven show’d,