Collected Poetical Works of Francesco Petrarch

by Francesco Petrarch

  Was built in ambient air: with constant sway

  I lead the grateful change of night and day,

  To one ethereal track for ever bound,

  And ever treading one eternal round.” —

  And now, methought, with more than mortal ire,

  He seem’d to lash along his steeds of fire;

  And shot along the air with glancing ray,

  Swift as a falcon darting on its prey;

  No planet’s swift career could match his speed,

  That seem’d the power of fancy to exceed.

  The courier of the sky I mark’d with dread,

  As by degrees the baseless fabric fled

  That human power had built, while high disdain

  I felt within to see the toiling train

  Striving to seize each transitory thing

  That fleets away on dissolution’s wing;

  And soonest from the firmest grasp recede,

  Like airy forms, with tantalizing speed.

  O mortals! ere the vital powers decay,

  Or palsied eld obscures the mental ray,

  Raise your affections to the things above,

  Which time or fickle chance can never move.

  Had you but seen what I despair to sing,

  How fast his courser plied the flaming wing

  With unremitted speed, the soaring mind

  Had left his low terrestrial cares behind.

  But what an awful change of earth and sky

  All in a moment pass’d before my eye!

  Now rigid winter stretch’d her brumal reign

  With frown Gorgonean over land and main;

  And Flora now her gaudy mantle spread,

  And many a blushing rose adorn’d her bed:

  The momentary seasons seem’d to fleet

  From bright solstitial dews to winter’s driving sleet.

  In circle multiform, and swift career:

  A wondrous tale, untold to mortal ear

  Before: yet reason’s calm unbiass’d view

  Must soon pronounce the seeming fable true,

  When deep remorse for many a wasted spring

  Still haunts the frighted soul on demon wing.

  Fond hope allured me on with meteor flight,

  And Love my fancy fed with vain delight,

  Chasing through fairy fields her pageants gay.

  But now, at last, a clear and steady ray,

  From reason’s mirror sent, my folly shows,

  And on my sight the hideous image throws

  Of what I am — a mind eclipsed and lost,

  By vice degraded from its noble post

  But yet, e’en yet, the mind’s elastic spring

  Buoys up my powers on resolution’s wing,

  While on the flight of time, with rueful gaze

  Intent, I try to thread the backward maze,

  And husband what remains, a scanty space.

  Few fleeting hours, alas! have pass’d away,

  Since a weak infant in the lap I lay;

  For what is human life but one uncertain day!

  Now hid by flying vapours, dark and cold,

  And brighten’d now with gleams of sunny gold,

  That mock the gazer’s eye with gaudy show,

  And leave the victim to substantial woe:

  Yet hope can live beneath the stormy sky,

  And empty pleasures have their pinions ply;

  And frantic pride exalts the lofty brow,

  Nor marks the snares of death that lurk below.

  Uncertain, whether now the shaft of fate

  Sings on the wind, or heaven prolongs my date.

  I see my hours run on with cruel speed,

  And in my doom the fate of all I read;

  A certain doom, which nature’s self must feel

  When the dread sentence checks the mundane wheel.

  Go! court the smiles of Hope, ye thoughtless crew!

  Her fairy scenes disclose an ample view

  To brainless men. But Wisdom o’er the field

  Casts her keen glance, and lifts her beamy shield

  To meet the point of Fate, that flies afar,

  And with stern vigilance expects the war.

  Perhaps in vain my admonitions fall,

  Yet still the Muse repeats the solemn call;

  Nor can she see unmoved your senses drown’d

  By Circe’s deadly spells in sleep profound.

  She cannot see the flying seasons roll

  In dread succession to the final goal,

  And sweep the tribes of men so fast away,

  To Stygian darkness or eternal day,

  With unconcern. — Oh! yet the doom repeal

  Before your callous hearts forget to feel;

  E’er Penitence foregoes her fruitless toil,

  Or hell’s black regent claims his human spoil

  Oh, haste! before the fatal arrows fly

  That send you headlong to the nether sky

  When down the gulf the sons of folly go

  In sad procession to the seat of woe!

  Thus deeply musing on the rapid round

  Of planetary speed, in thought profound

  I stood, and long bewail’d my wasted hours,

  My vain afflictions, and my squander’d powers:

  When, in deliberate march, a train was seen

  In silent order moving o’er the green;

  A band that seem’d to hold in high disdain

  The desolating power of Time’s resistless reign:

  Their names were hallow’d in the Muse’s song,

  Wafted by fame from age to age along,

  High o’er oblivion’s deep, devouring wave,

  Where millions find an unrefunding grave.

  With envious glance the changeful power beheld

  The glorious phalanx which his power repell’d,

  And faster now the fiery chariot flew,

  While Fame appear’d the rapid flight to rue,

  And labour’d some to save. But, close behind,

  I heard a voice, which, like the western wind,

  That whispers softly through the summer shade,

  These solemn accents to mine ear convey’d: —

  “Man is a falling flower; and Fame in vain

  Strives to protract his momentaneous reign

  Beyond his bounds, to match the rolling tide,

  On whose dread waves the long olympiads ride,

  Till, fed by time, the deep procession grows,

  And in long centuries continuous flows;

  For what the power of ages can oppose?

  Though Tempe’s rolling flood, or Hebrus claim

  Renown, they soon shall live an empty name.

  Where are their heroes now, and those who led

  The files of war by Xanthus’ gory bed?

  Or Tuscan Tyber’s more illustrious band,

  Whose conquering eagles flew o’er sea and land?

  What is renown? — a gleam of transient light,

  That soon an envious cloud involves in night,

  While passing Time’s malignant hands diffuse

  On many a noble name pernicious dews.

  Thus our terrestrial glories fade away,

  Our triumphs pass the pageants of a day;

  Our fields exchange their lords, our kingdoms fall,

  And thrones are wrapt in Hades’ funeral pall

  Yet virtue seldom gains what vice had lost,

  And oft the hopes of good desert are cross’d.

  Not wealth alone, but mental stores decay,

  And, like the gifts of Mammon, pass away;

  Nor wisdom, wealth, nor fortune can withstand

  His desolating march by sea and land;

  Nor prayers, nor regal power his wheels restrain,

  Till he has ground us down to dust again.

  Though various are the titles men can plead,

  Some for a time enjoy the glorious meed

  That merit claims; ye
t unrelenting fate

  On all the doom pronounces soon or late;

  And whatsoe’er the vulgar think or say,

  Were not your lives thus shorten’d to a day,

  Your eyes would see the consummating power

  His countless millions at a meal devour.”

  And reason’s voice my stubborn mind subdued;

  Conviction soon the solemn words pursued;

  I saw all mortal glory pass away,

  Like vernal snows beneath the rising ray;

  And wealth, and power, and honour, strive in vain

  To ‘scape the laws of Time’s despotic reign.

  Though still to vulgar eyes they seem to claim

  A lot conspicuous in the lists of Fame,

  Transient as human joys; to feeble age

  They love to linger on this earthly stage,

  And think it cruel to be call’d away

  On the faint morn of life’s disastrous day.

  Yet ah! how many infants on the breast

  By Heaven’s indulgence sink to endless rest!

  And oft decrepid age his lot bewails,

  Whom every ill of lengthen’d life assails.

  Hence sick despondence thinks the human lot

  A gift of fleeting breath too dearly bought:

  But should the voice of Fame’s obstreperous blast

  From ages on to future ages last,

  E’en to the trump of doom, — how poor the prize

  Whose worth depends upon the changing skies!

  What time bestows and claims (the fleeting breath

  Of Fame) is but, at best, a second death —

  A death that none of mortal race can shun,

  That wastes the brood of time, and triumphs o’er the sun.

  BOYD.

  THE TRIUMPH OF ETERNITY.

  Da poi che sotto ‘l ciel cosa non vidi.

  When all beneath the ample cope of heaven

  I saw, like clouds before the tempest driven,

  In sad vicissitude’s eternal round,

  Awhile I stood in holy horror bound;

  And thus at last with self-exploring mind,

  Musing, I ask’d, “What basis I could find

  To fix my trust?” An inward voice replied,

  “Trust to the Almighty: He thy steps shall guide;

  He never fails to hear the faithful prayer,

  But worldly hope must end in dark despair.”

  Now, what I am, and what I was, I know;

  I see the seasons in procession go

  With still increasing speed; while things to come,

  Unknown, unthought, amid the growing gloom

  Of long futurity, perplex my soul,

  While life is posting to its final goal.

  Mine is the crime, who ought with clearer light

  To watch the winged years’ incessant flight;

  And not to slumber on in dull delay

  Till circling seasons bring the doomful day.

  But grace is never slow in that, I trust,

  To wake the mind, before I sink to dust,

  With those strong energies that lift the soul

  To scenes unhoped, unthought, above the pole.

  While thus I ponder’d, soon my working thought

  Once more that ever-changing picture brought

  Of sublunary things before my view,

  And thus I question’d with myself anew: —

  “What is the end of this incessant flight

  Of life and death, alternate day and night?

  When will the motion on these orbs impress’d

  Sink on the bosom of eternal rest?”

  At once, as if obsequious to my will,

  Another prospect shone, unmoved and still;

  Eternal as the heavens that glow’d above,

  A wide resplendent scene of light and love.

  The wheels of Phoebus from the zodiac turn’d;

  No more the nightly constellations burn’d;

  Green earth and undulating ocean roll’d

  Away, by some resistless power controll’d;

  Immensity conceived, and brought to birth

  A grander firmament, and more luxuriant earth.

  What wonder seized my soul when first I view’d

  How motionless the restless racer stood,

  Whose flying feet, with winged speed before,

  Still mark’d with sad mutation sea and shore.

  No more he sway’d the future and the past,

  But on the moveless present fix’d at last;

  As at a goal reposing from his toils,

  Like earth unclothed of all its vernal foils.

  Unvaried scene! where neither change nor fate,

  Nor care, nor sorrow, can our joys abate;

  Nor finds the light of thought resistance here,

  More than the sunbeams in a crystal sphere.

  But no material things can match their flight,

  In speed excelling far the race of light.

  Oh! what a glorious lot shall then be mine

  If Heaven to me these nameless joys assign!

  For there the sovereign good for ever reigns,

  Nor evil yet to come, nor present pains;

  No baleful birth of time its inmates fear,

  That comes, the burthen of the passing year;

  No solar chariot circles through the signs,

  And now too near, and now too distant, shines;

  To wretched man and earth’s devoted soil

  Dispensing sad variety of toil.

  Oh! happy are the blessed souls that sing

  Loud hallelujahs in eternal ring!

  Thrice happy he, who late, at last shall find

  A lot in the celestial climes assign’d!

  He, led by grace, the auspicious ford explores,

  Where, cross the plains, the wintry torrent roars;

  That troublous tide, where, with incessant strife,

  Weak mortals struggle through, and call it life.

  In love with Vanity, oh, doubly blind

  Are they that final consolation find

  In things that fleet on dissolution’s wing,

  Or dance away upon the transient ring

  Of seasons, as they roll. No sound they hear

  From that still voice that Wisdom’s sons revere;

  No vestment they procure to keep them warm

  Against the menace of the wintry storm;

  But all exposed, in naked nature lie,

  A shivering crowd beneath the inclement sky,

  Of reason void, by every foe subdued,

  Self-ruin’d, self-deprived of sovereign good;

  Reckless of Him, whose universal sway,

  Matter, and all its various forms, obey;

  Whether they mix in elemental strife,

  Or meet in married calm, and foster life.

  His nature baffles all created mind,

  In earth or heaven, to fathom, or to find.

  One glimpse of glory on the saints bestow’d,

  With eager longings fills the courts of God

  For deeper views, in that abyss of light,

  While mortals slumber here, content with night:

  Though nought, we find, below the moon, can fill

  The boundless cravings of the human will.

  And yet, what fierce desire the fancy wings

  To gain a grasp of perishable things;

  Although one fleeting hour may scatter far

  The fruit of many a year’s corroding care;

  Those spacious regions where our fancies roam,

  Pain’d by the past, expecting ills to come,

  In some dread moment, by the fates assign’d,

  Shall pass away, nor leave a rack behind;

  And Time’s revolving wheels shall lose at last

  The speed that spins the future and the past;

  And, sovereign of an undisputed throne,

  Awful eternity shall reign alone.

 
Then every darksome veil shall fleet away

  That hides the prospects of eternal day:

  Those cloud-born objects of our hopes and fears,

  Whose air-drawn forms deluded memory bears

  As of substantial things, away so fast

  Shall fleet, that mortals, at their speed aghast,

  Watching the change of all beneath the moon,

  Shall ask, what once they were, and will be soon?

  The time will come when every change shall cease,

  This quick revolving wheel shall rest in peace:

  No summer then shall glow, nor winter freeze;

  Nothing shall be to come, and nothing past,

  But an eternal now shall ever last.

  Though time shall be no more, yet space shall give

  A nobler theatre to love and live

  The wingèd courier then no more shall claim

  The power to sink or raise the notes of Fame,

  Or give its glories to the noontide ray:

  True merit then, in everlasting day,

  Shall shine for ever, as at first it shone

  At once to God and man and angels known.

  Happy are they who in this changing sphere

  Already have begun the bright career

  That reaches to the goal which, all in vain,

  The Muse would blazon in her feeble strain:

  But blest above all other blest is he

  Who from the trammels of mortality,

  Ere half the vital thread ran out, was free,

  Mature for Heaven; where now the matchless fair

  Preserves those features, that seraphic air,

  And all those mental charms that raised my mind,

  To judge of heaven while yet on earth confined.

  That soft attractive glance that won my heart

  When first my bosom felt unusual smart,

  Now beams, now glories, in the realms above,

  Fed by the eternal source of light and love.

  Then shall I see her as I first beheld,

  But lovelier far, and by herself excell’d;

  And I distinguish’d in the bands above

  Shall hear this plaudit in the choirs of love: —

  “Lo! this is he who sung in mournful strains

  For many years a lover’s doubts and pains;

  Yet in this soul-expanding, sweet employ,

  A sacred transport felt above all vulgar joy.”

  She too shall wonder at herself to hear

  Her praises ring around the radiant sphere:

  But of that hour it is not mine to know;

  To her, perhaps, the period of my woe

  Is manifest; for she my fate may find

  In the pure mirror of the eternal mind.

  To me it seems at hand a sure presage,

  Denotes my rise from this terrestrial stage;

  Then what I gain’d and lost below shall lie