The Poetry of Petrarch

by David Young

  Works Cited

  Barolini, Teodolinda. “The Making of a Lyric Sequence: Time and Narrative in Petrarch’s Rerum vulgarium fragmenta,” MLN, vol. 104, no. 1, January 1989, 1–38.

  Bergin, Thomas G. The Sonnets of Petrarch. Heritage Press, 1966.

  Bishop, Morris. Petrarch and His World. Indiana University Press, 1963.

  Cook, James Wyatt. Petrarch’s Songbook. Pegasus Press, 1995.

  Durling, Robert K. Petrarch’s Lyric Poems. Harvard University Press, 1976.

  Hainsworth, Peter. “Laden with Oblivion,” Times Literary Supplement, May 18, 2001, 25.

  Kalstone, David. Sidney’s Poetry: Context and Interpretations. Harvard University Press, 1965.

  Kilmer, Nicholas. Songs and Sonnets from Laura’s Lifetime. North Point Press, 1981.

  Lewis, C. S. English Literature of the Sixteenth Century. Oxford University Press, 1954.

  Musa, Mark. Selections from the Canzoniere and Other Works. Oxford World’s Classics, 1985.

  ———. Petrarch: The Canzoniere. Indiana University Press, 1996.

  Nichols, J. G. Petrarch, Canzoniere. Carcanet, 2000.

  Thompson, David. Petrarch, a Humanist Among Princes: An Anthology of Petrarch’s Letters and of Selections from His Other Works. Harper & Row, 1971.

  Wilkins, Ernest Hatch. The Making of the “Canzoniere” and Other Petrarchan Studies. Edizioni di Storia e Litteratura, 1951.

  ———. Life of Petrarch. University of Chicago Press, 1961.

  ———. Petrarch’s Later Years. Medieval Academy of America, 1959.

  The Canzoniere, 1–366

  1

  All you who hear in scattered rhymes the sound

  of heavy sighs with which I fed my heart

  during the time of my first youthful straying

  when I was not the man I’ve since become:

  for the mixed style in which I speak and weep,

  caught between empty hopes and empty sorrow,

  from anyone who knows of love firsthand

  I hope to find some sympathy—and pardon.

  I can see now that I was made the subject

  of lots of gossip among lots of people;

  inside myself I’m often filled with shame;

  shame is the fruit of all my clever ravings;

  so are repentance and my knowing clearly

  that every worldly pleasure is a dream.

  2

  To make a graceful one his sweet vendetta,

  redress a thousand slights in one quick swoop,

  Love stealthily picked up his bow, much as

  a man who schemes a time and place to hurt.

  My vital power was buttressed in my heart

  and well defended, there and in my eyes,

  until the harsh stroke landed, where before

  all arrows that had come had glanced away:

  that sudden onslaught and its fell success

  left my poor power bewildered and in pain.

  It had no time for weapons; it grew weak,

  it couldn’t help me climb the weary mountain,

  it couldn’t whisk me from that scene of slaughter.

  It meant to help, would like to now, but can’t.

  3

  It was the day the sun himself grew pale

  with grieving for his Maker—I was seized

  and made no effort to defend myself;

  your lovely eyes had held and bound me, Lady.

  It didn’t seem a time to be on guard

  against Love’s blows, so I went confident

  and fearless on my way. My troubles started

  amid the universal sense of woe.

  Love found me wholly undefended, with

  the way from eyes to heart completely open,

  eyes that are now the conduit for tears.

  He got no glory by it; I was helpless.

  And he let you escape with no attack

  when you were well defended, fully armed.

  4

  He who showed endless providence and art,

  the master craftsman of this shining world,

  who made the hemispheres, this one and that,

  and proved a Jove, more mild than a Mars,

  who came here to illuminate the leaves

  that had concealed the truth for many years,

  took John and Peter from their fishing nets

  and gave them portions of his Paradise;

  He, for his birth, did not bestow himself

  on Rome, but chose Judea, since he cared

  among all states to elevate the humblest.

  And now he’s given us a sun from one

  small village, so that we thank Nature and

  the place that gave the world this fairest lady.

  5

  When I breathe out my sighs and call your name,

  that name that Love has etched upon my heart,

  I start it out with something LAUdatory

  to get those first sweet accents into sound;

  your REgal state, which I encounter next,

  doubles my strength for such high enterprise,

  but “TAper off!” the ending roars, “her fame

  must rest on shoulders better fit than yours.”

  Thus LAUd and REverence are quickly taught

  whenever someone calls you, you so worthy,

  oh so deserving of respect and praise,

  unless Apollo feels no morTAl tongue

  should ever be presumptuous to speak

  of his sweet laurel boughs, forever green.

  6

  My mad desire has gone so far astray

  pursuing her, who turned away to flee,

  and, free and clear of all the snares of Love,

  runs easily ahead of my slow pace,

  that when I try to call desire back

  and take him home by some safe path, he balks,

  nor can I round him up or shepherd him

  since Love has made him riotous by nature;

  and when he takes the bit by force from me,

  then I submit to him and to his mastery;

  he carries me toward death against my will

  and brings me sometimes to the laurel tree

  whose bitter fruit, once gathered and consumed,

  deepens one’s woes instead of soothing them.

  7

  Gorging and sleep and lounging on pillows

  have banished every virtue from this world,

  and thus our better natures, habit-hobbled,

  have let their functions wither and decay;

  all heavenly lights by which we see the way

  to shape our human lives have been snuffed out;

  whoever wants to bring us streams from Helicon

  is pointed out and called a prodigy.

  Who cares for laurel now? And who loves myrtle?

  “Naked and poor, Philosophy, go beg!”

  the mob howls now, absorbed by its own greed.

  You will have few companions on your way:

  It’s therefore all the more important, friend,

  you not abandon your great-hearted quest.

  8

  Below the foothills where she first put on

  the lovely garment of her earthly limbs—

  that lady who can often rouse from sleep

  the tearful man who sends us to you now—

  we passed our lives in tranquil peace and freedom,

  as every living thing desires to do;

  we had no fears as we went on our way

  of stepping into snares that caught us up.

  But for the woeful state to which we’re brought

  out of our carefree life and to this death,

  we have one solitary consolation:

  revenge on him who brought us to this end,

  for he remains in someone else’s power,

  facing his own end, bound with a stronger chain.

  9

  When sun, the planet marking off the
hours,

  returns again to live in Taurus’ house,

  vigor spills forth out of his flaming horns

  and tricks the whole world out in fresher colors.

  And not just things, spread out before our gaze,

  the hills and shores, ablaze with their new flowers,

  but underground, where daylight never goes,

  he makes the depths of earth grow fertile too,

  and they produce these fruits and others like them.

  The same way she, who is a sun herself,

  turns her sweet eyes upon me and stirs up

  the thoughts and words and deeds that deal with love:

  but any way she rules or governs them,

  spring still can never happen in my heart.

  10

  Glorious Column, raising up our hope,

  and carrying great Latium’s reputation,

  who never turned aside from the true path

  despite Jove’s anger and wind-driven rain:

  we have no palaces, arcades, or theaters;

  we have instead a fir, a beech, a pine—

  the green grass all around, the neighbor mountain

  which we climb up and down, making our poems;

  these lift our spirits up from earth to Heaven;

  and then the nightingale laments and weeps

  from shadows every night so sweetly that

  our hearts grow heavy, filled with thoughts of love.

  Yet all this good you spoil and make imperfect

  because, my lord, you do not come and join us!

  11

  I’ve never seen you put aside your veil,

  for sun or shadow, Lady,

  not since you learned about the great desire

  that drives all other feelings from my heart.

  When all my loving thoughts were unexpressed

  (those thoughts that bring my heart desire for death),

  compassion toward me shone upon your face;

  but ever since Love made you notice me,

  your blond hair has been veiled, your loving gaze

  has pulled itself away and turned to others.

  What I desired in you has been taken;

  that veil controls me now,

  and plots my death in weather warm or icy

  because it shades the sweet light of your eyes.

  12

  If my life can withstand this bitter torment,

  surviving tribulation long enough

  to see your later years, my lady, dimming,

  the light extinguished from your lovely eyes,

  your head of fine gold hair transformed to silver,

  your garlands laid aside with your green dresses,

  your face drained very slowly of that color

  which makes me hesitate and then lament,

  then Love may also grant me timely courage

  to speak at last of my great suffering,

  to tell you of its years, its days, its hours;

  if time should be adverse to my sweet wishes,

  at least it won’t prevent my pain receiving

  some small relief from my belated sighs.

  13

  When now and then among the other ladies,

  Love makes his home within her charming face,

  the ways in which each one can’t match her beauty

  renew desire, and my passion thrives.

  I bless the place, the time, I bless the hour

  that raised my eyes so high; and thus I say:

  “Soul, you must give both deep and hearty thanks

  that for that honor you were first picked out.

  “The loving thoughts that she aroused in you

  can make you climb up toward the highest good,

  and teach you to hate things most men desire;

  she’ll fill your mind with a courageous joy,

  and lead you thus toward Heaven, a straight path

  along which I am moving, high with hope.”

  14

  My weary eyes, when I direct you toward

  the lovely face of her who’s murdered you,

  be careful, please, I beg you:

  Love will assail you, and that makes me sigh.

  Nothing but Death can stop my thoughts from taking

  the loving road that leads them forward to

  a harbor and sweet haven where they’ll heal;

  but your light, eyes, can be disrupted, lost

  to lesser things, for you are made less perfect,

  the power that sustains you is too weak.

  So go and cry a little now, I say,

  before the hours of tears that lie ahead,

  take some brief solace here

  before you undergo long martyrdom.

  15

  At every step I make I turn around

  then shove my weary body on ahead,

  and take a little comfort from your air

  that helps me to plod on, crying “Alas!”

  I stop, then, in my tracks, to recollect

  the awesome presence that I’ve left behind,

  the road ahead so long, my life so short,

  and bow my head and burst out into tears.

  While I’m lamenting, every now and then,

  a doubt arrives to torment me and haunt me:

  how can these limbs survive without their spirit?

  Love has an answer, though: “Don’t you recall?

  This is the privilege reserved for lovers,

  released from all their human qualities.”

  16

  White-haired and pale, the old man takes his leave

  of this sweet place where he has lived his life;

  his little family watches in dismay

  as their dear father disappears from sight;

  and so he drags his ancient flanks along,

  through these last days and hours of his life;

  his years a burden, and his travel tiring,

  goodwill is what he draws on to survive;

  he comes to Rome—he must pursue his fancy,

  he wants to gaze upon the face of Him

  he hopes he’ll see eventually in Heaven.

  In just that way, alas, I go and search

  in others, Lady, hoping I might find

  somehow, somewhere, your much-desired shape.

  17

  Bitter tears come raining down my face

  accompanied by an anguished wind of sighs,

  all times I turn my eyes in your direction

  who’ve made me quite alone, lost to the world.

  It’s true your smile, mild and full of peace,

  retains the power to calm my passion down

  and free me from the flames that torture me

  while I’m intent and fixed on watching you;

  but then my spirits are transformed to ice

  because we part and those two fatal stars

  direct their movements elsewhere, leaving me.

  Unlocked and set at large at last, my soul

  pulls up within my heart to try to follow,

  and its uprooting brings on wild havoc.

  18

  When I am turned around to see the place

  where shines my lady’s face, so full of light,

  and in my thoughts the light remains and thrives,

  burns down and melts, inside me, bit by bit,

  I think my heart is going to crack in half,

  and fear that I am going to lose my light,

  and feel my way, still groping in the dark,

  a blind man with no place to go, yet going.

  I run away to dodge the blows of death

  but not so fast that passion doesn’t come

  right at my side, the way it always does;

  I go in silence, since my fatal words

  would make men weep and what I really want

  is solitude in which to shed my tears.

  19

  Some animals there are with eyes s
o strong

  they have no fear of sunlight; others, though,

  because they can’t exist in such bright light,

  don’t venture forth until the dusk arrives;

  and others still, imbued with mad desire,

  plunge toward the fire to enjoy its gleam,

  and come upon a force that burns them up;

  alas, it seems that I am of this species.

  For I lack strength to gaze straight at the light

  this lady radiates, and lack the sense

  to shield myself in shadows and late hours;

  therefore, despite my weak and tearful eyes,

  my destiny leads me to seek and see her,

  drawn to the thing that I know will consume me.

  20

  Sometimes, ashamed that I have not been rhyming

  to praise your beauty, oh, my gentle Lady,

  I let my mind go back to your first sight;

  no other beauty moved me after that,

  but it’s a weight my arms can’t really carry,

  roughness my file does not know how to hone;

  and when it feels its lack of strength, my wit

  freezes in place and will not go on working.

  Time and again, right on the verge of speech,

  my voice has stayed inside me, holding back:

  what sound could ever reach to such a height?

  Time and again, when I began to write,

  I found my pen and hand and intellect

  were all defeated in the first assault.

  21

  A thousand times, oh, my sweet warrior,

  to make a pact of peace with your fair eyes,

  I’ve offered up my heart, but you don’t deign

  to glance down from your elevated mind;

  if any other lady wants my heart

  she lives in weak and much-mistaken hopes;

  and since I hate whatever you don’t care for,

  I think he never can be mine again.

  Now if I drive him off and you won’t take him,

  he’ll have no help in his unhappy exile;

  he cannot live alone, nor be with others,

  so probably his course of life will fail,

  and that would be a fault in both of us;

  you more, I think, since he loves you the most.

  22

  For any animal who dwells on earth,

  (except those few who hate to be in sun),

  the time for labor is throughout the day;

  but then when Heaven kindles all its stars

  some go back home, some nest within the forest

  and take their rest at least until the dawn.

  And I, when lovely day begins to dawn

  and scatters shadows from around the earth,