The Sonnets, Triumphs, and Other Poems of Petrarch Part 51

Gay, joyous blooms, and herbage glad with showers, O'er which my pensive fair is wont to stray!

Thou plain, that listest her melodious lay, As her fair feet imprint thy waste of flowers!

Ye shrubs so trim; ye green, unfolding bowers; Ye violets clad in amorous, pale array; Thou shadowy grove, gilded by beauty's ray, Whose top made proud majestically towers!

O pleasant country! O translucent stream, Bathing her lovely face, her eyes so clear, And catching of their living light the beam!

I envy ye her actions chaste and dear: No rock shall stud thy waters, but shall learn Henceforth with pa.s.sion strong as mine to burn.

NOTT.

O bright and happy flowers and herbage blest, On which my lady treads!--O favour'd plain, That hears her accents sweet, and can retain The traces by her fairy steps impress'd!-- Pure shrubs, with tender verdure newly dress'd,-- Pale amorous violets,--leafy woods, whose reign Thy sun's bright rays transpierce, and thus sustain Your lofty stature, and umbrageous crest;-- O thou, fair country, and thou, crystal stream, Which bathes her countenance and sparkling eyes, Stealing fresh l.u.s.tre from their living beam; How do I envy thee these precious ties!

Thy rocky sh.o.r.es will soon be taught to gleam With the same flame that burns in all my sighs.

WROTTESLEY.

SONNET Cx.x.x.

_Amor, che vedi ogni pensiero aperto._

HE CARES NOT FOR SUFFERINGS, SO THAT HE DISPLEASE NOT LAURA.

Love, thou who seest each secret thought display'd, And the sad steps I take, with thee sole guide; This throbbing breast, to thee thrown open wide, To others' prying barr'd, thine eyes pervade.

Thou know'st what efforts, following thee, I made, While still from height to height thy pinions glide; Nor deign'st one pitying look to turn aside On him who, fainting, treads a trackless glade.

I mark from far the mildly-beaming ray To which thou goad'st me through the devious maze; Alas! I want thy wings, to speed my way-- Henceforth, a distant homager, I'll gaze, Content by silent longings to decay, So that my sighs for her in her no anger raise.

WRANGHAM.

O Love, that seest my heart without disguise, And those hard toils from thee which I sustain, Look to my inmost thought; behold the pain To thee unveil'd, hid from all other eyes.

Thou know'st for thee this breast what suffering tries; Me still from day to day o'er hill and plain Thou chasest; heedless still, while I complain As to my wearied steps new thorns arise.

True, I discern far off the cheering light To which, through trackless wilds, thou urgest me: But wings like thine to bear me to delight I want:--Yet from these pangs I would not flee, Finding this only favour in her sight, That not displeased my love and death she see.

CAPEL LOFFT.

SONNET Cx.x.xI.

_Or che 'l ciel e la terra e 'l vento tace._

NIGHT BRINGS PEACE TO ALL SAVE HIM.

O'er earth and sky her lone watch silence keeps, And bird and beast in stirless slumber lie, Her starry chariot Night conducts on high, And in its bed the waveless ocean sleeps.

I wake, muse, burn, and weep; of all my pain The one sweet cause appears before me still; War is my lot, which grief and anger fill, And thinking but of her some rest I gain.

Thus from one bright and living fountain flows The bitter and the sweet on which I feed; One hand alone can harm me or can heal: And thus my martyrdom no limit knows, A thousand deaths and lives each day I feel, So distant are the paths to peace which lead.

MACGREGOR.

'Tis now the hour when midnight silence reigns O'er earth and sea, and whispering Zephyr dies Within his rocky cell; and Morpheus chains Each beast that roams the wood, and bird that wings the skies.

More blest those rangers of the earth and air, Whom night awhile relieves from toil and pain; Condemn'd to tears and sighs, and wasting care.

To me the circling sun descends in vain!

Ah me! that mingling miseries and joys, Too near allied, from one sad fountain flow!

The magic hand that comforts and annoys Can hope, and fell despair, and life, and death bestow!

Too great the bliss to find in death relief: Fate has not yet fill'd up the measure of my grief.

WOODHOUSELEE.

SONNET Cx.x.xII.

_Come 'l candido pie per l' erba fresca._

HER WALK, LOOKS, WORDS, AND AIR.

As o'er the fresh gra.s.s her fair form its sweet And graceful pa.s.sage makes at evening hours, Seems as around the newly-wakening flowers Found virtue issue from her delicate feet.

Love, which in true hearts only has his seat, Nor elsewhere deigns to prove his certain powers, So warm a pleasure from her bright eyes showers, No other bliss I ask, no better meat.

And with her soft look and light step agree Her mild and modest, never eager air, And sweetest words in constant union rare.

From these four sparks--nor only these we see-- Springs the great fire wherein I live and burn, Which makes me from the sun as night-birds turn.

MACGREGOR.

SONNET Cx.x.xIII.

_S' io fossi stato fermo alla spelunca._

TO ONE WHO DESIRED LATIN VERSE OF HIM.

Still had I sojourn'd in that Delphic cave Where 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 more Enrich my land, needs must that I pursue 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 stream Whose source from famed Parna.s.sus was derived.

Whereby of yore it throve in best esteem.

Me fortune thus, or fault perchance, deprived Of all good fruit--unless eternal Jove Shower on my head some favour from above.

MACGREGOR.