Authors: Mark Musa
Petrarch (29 page)
ch’ aver dentro a lui parme
un che Madonna sempre
depinge et de lei parla;
a voler poi ritrarla
per me non basto et par ch’ io me ne stempre:
lasso, cosi m’è scorso
lo mio dolce soccorso.
Come fanciul ch’ a pena
volge la lingua et snoda,
che dir non sa ma ’l più tacer gli è noia,
cosi ’l desir mi mena
a dire, et vo’ che m’oda
la dolce mia nemica anzi ch’ io moia.
Se forse ogni sua gioia
nel suo bel viso è solo
et di tutt’ altro è schiva,
odil tu, verde riva,
e presta a’ miei sospir si largo volo
che sempre si ridica
come tu m’eri amica.
Ben sai che si bel piede
non toccò terra unquanco
come quel dì che già segnata fosti,
onde ’l cor lasso riede
does branch or leaf or flower
reveal the
natural goodness
it contains.
Let those fair eyes and Love
see what my heart encloses.
If grief that is unburdened
should overflow in tears or in laments,
the one pains me, the other
another,
for it is crude
.
O sweet and graceful verse
that in my first assault
on Love I used—I had
no other arms
—
will someone
come and break
this
heart
of mine that’s stone
so I can vent my feelings as I used to?
There seems inside him one
who always
paints
my lady
and talks about her there;
to describe her on my own
I cannot do, so I become
untuned
;
alas, and so has fled
that sweet comfort of mine.
Just as a child that hardly
can get his
tongue untied
,
who cannot speak but hates not speaking more,
so my desire
leads me
to speak, and I want her,
my own sweet foe, to hear me before I die.
But if all of her joy
and cares for nothing else,
then
you, green shore
, must listen
and lend to my laments so wide a flight
that it can be recalled
how good a friend you were.
You know a foot so lovely
as on that day when you were
marked by hers
,
and so my tired heart
col tormentoso fianco
a partir teco i lor pensier nascosti.
Così avestu riposti
de’ be’ vestigi sparsi
ancor tra’ fiori et l’erba,
che la mia vita acerba
lagrimando trovasse ove acquetarsi!
ma come po s’appaga
l’aima dubbiosa et vaga.
Ovunque gli occhi volgo
trovo un dolce sereno
pensando: “Qui percosse il vago lume.”
Qualunque erba o fior colgo,
credo che nel terreno
aggia radice ov’ ella ebbe in costume
gir fra le piagge e ’l flume
et talor farsi un seggio
fresco fiorito et verde.
Così nulla sen perde,
et più certezza averne fora il peggio.
Spirto beato, quale
se’ quando altrui fai taie?
O poverella mia, come se’ rozza!
Credo che tel conoschi:
rimanti in questi boschi.
returns with a pained body
to share with you the thoughts which they have hidden.
If only you had left
among the grass and flowers
so that my bitter life
in tears might find a place
where it could rest
!
My vague and unsure soul
must do the best it can.
Wherever my eyes turn
I find
sweet brightness
there
and think: “
That lovely light
once struck
right here.”
All grass or blooms I pick
I think have had their
roots
in that same ground where she was wont to walk
between the banks and river
fresh, flowering, and green.
This way
no part is lost
,
and knowing more exactly
would be worse
.
How great you are, blessed spirit,
when you do this to others.
O my poor little thing
, how coarse you are!
I think you know it though.
Stay here inside these woods!
Chiare fresche et dolci acque,
ove le belle membra
pose colei che sola a me par donna,
gentil ramo ove piacque
(con sospir mi rimembra)
a lei di fare al bel flanco colonna;
erba et flor che la gonna
leggiadra ricoverse
co l’angelico seno;
aere sacro sereno
ove Amor co’ begli occhi il cor m’aperse:
date udienzia insieme
a le dolenti mie parole estreme.
S’ egli è pur mio destino,
e ’l cielo in ciò s’adopra,
ch’ Amor quest’occhi lagrimando chiuda,
qualche grazia il meschino
corpo fra voi ricopra,
e torni l’alma al proprio albergo ignuda;
la morte fia men cruda
se questa spene porto
a quel dubbioso passo,
ché lo spirito lasso
non poria mai in più riposato porto
né in più tranquilla fossa
fuggir la carne travagliata et l’ossa.
Tempo verra ancor forse
ch’ a l’usato soggiorno
torni la fera bella et mansueta,
et là ’v’ ella mi scorse
nel benedetto giorno
volga la vista disiosa et lieta,
cercandomi, et—o pieta—
già terra infra le pietre
vedendo, Amor l’inspiri
in guisa che sospiri
si dolcemente che mercé m’impetre
Clear, cool, sweet, running waters
where she, for me the only
woman, would
rest her lovely body
;
kind branch
on which it pleased her
(
I sigh
to think of it)
to make a column for her lovely side;
and grass and flowers which
her gown
,
richly flowing, covered
with its angelic folds;
sacred air serene
where Love with those fair eyes
opened my heart
:
listen all of you together
to these my mournful, my last words.
If it, indeed, must be my fate,
and Heaven works its ways,
that Love close up these eyes while they still weep,
let grace
see my poor body
be buried there
among you
and let my soul
return to its home
naked;
then death would be less harsh
if I could bear this hope
unto that fearful crossing,
because the weary soul
could never in a
more secluded port
,
in a more tranquil grave,
flee from
my poor belabored flesh and bones.
And there will come a time
, perhaps,
that to the
well-known place
the lovely animal
returns, and tamed,
and there where she first saw me
that day which now is blessed,
she turns her eyes
with hope and happiness
in search of me, and—ah, the pity—
to see me there as dust
among the stones, Love will
inspire her and she will sigh
so sweetly she will win for me some mercy
et faccia forza al cielo,
asciugandosi gli occhi col bel velo.
Da be’ rami scendea
(dolce ne la memoria)
una pioggia di fior sovra ’l suo grembo,
et ella si sedea
umile in tanta gloria,
coverta già de l’amoroso nembo;
qual fior cadea sul lembo,
qual su le treccie bionde
ch’ oro forbito et perle
eran quel di a vederle,
qual si posava in terra et qual su l’onde,
qual con un vago errore
girando parea dir: “Qui regna Amore.”
Quante volte diss’ io
allor, pien di spavento:
“Costei per fermo nacque in paradiso!”
Così careo d’oblio
il divin portamento
e ’l volto e le parole e ’l dolce riso
m’aveano, et si diviso
da l’imagine vera,
ch’ i’ dicea sospirando:
“Qui come venn’ io o quando?”
credendo esser in ciel, non là dov’ era.
Da indi in qua mi piace
quest’erba sì ch’ altrove non ò pace.
Se tu avessi ornamenti quant’ ài voglia,
poresti arditamente
uscir del bosco et gir infra la gente.
and
force open
the heavens
drying her eyes there with
her lovely veil
.
Falling from gracious boughs,
I sweetly call to mind,
were
flowers in a rain
upon her bosom,
and she was
sitting there
humble in such glory
now covered
in a shower of
love’s blooms
:
a flower falling
on her lap
,
some fell
on her blond curls
,
like pearls
set into gold
they seemed to me that day;
some fell to rest on ground, some on the water,
and some in
lovelike wandering
were circling down and saying, “
Here Love reigns
.”
How often I would say
at that time, full of awe:
“For certain she was born up there in Heaven!”
And her divine behavior,
her face and words and her sweet smile
so
filled me with forgetfulness
and so divided me
that I would sigh and say:
“Just
how and when
did I come here?”
thinking I was in Heaven,
not where I was
;
and since then I have loved
this bank of grass
and find peace nowhere else.
If you had all the beauty you desired,
you could
with boldness
leave
the wood and make your way among mankind.
In quella parte dove Amor mi sprona
conven ch’ io volga le dogliose rime
che son seguaci de la mente afflitta:
quai fien ultime, lasso, et qua’ fien prime?
Collui che del mio mal meco ragiona
mi lascia in dubbio, si confuso ditta.
Ma pur quanto la storia trovo scritta
in mezzo ’l cor che si spesso rincorro
co la sua propria man de’ miei martiri
dirô, perché i sospiri
parlando àn triegua et al dolor soccorro.
Dico che perch’ io miri
mille cose diverse attento et fiso,
sol una donna veggio e ’l suo bel viso.
Poi che la dispietata mia ventura
m’à dilungato dal maggior mio bene,
noiosa inesorabile et superba,
Amor col rimembrar sol mi mantene:
onde s’ io veggio in giovenil figura
incominciarsi il mondo a vestir d’erba,
parmi veder in quella etate acerba
la bella giovenetta ch’ ora è donna;
poi che sormonta riscaldando il sole,
parmi qual esser sòle
fiamma d’amor che ’n cor alto s’endonna;
ma quando il dì si dole
di lui che passo passo a dietro torni,
veggio lei giunta a’ suoi perfetti giorni.
In ramo fronde o ver viole in terra
mirando a la stagion che ’l freddo perde
et le stelle miglior acquistan forza,
ne gli occhi ò pur le violette e ’l verde
di ch’ era nel principio de mia guerra
Amor armato sì ch’ ancor mi sforza,
et quella dolce leggiadretta scorza
che ricopria le pargolette membra
dove oggi alberga l’anima gentile
ch’ ogni altro piacer vile
In that direction
which love urges me
I now must turn these verses full of sorrow,
the followers of my afflicted mind:
which
shall be last
, alas, and which the first?
The one who speaks to me about my ills
leaves me in doubt;
he dictates with confusion
.
Still
I shall tell the story
of my suffering
as much as I find written in his hand
within my heart which often I review,
so that my sighs have rest
and speaking is a help to all my grief.
I say that
, though I gaze
intent and fixed on a thousand different things,
I see one lady only, one fair face.
Because it was my pitiless misfortune
that sent me from that
greatest good of mine
,
painful
, inexorable, and proud,
Love gives me life through memory alone;
so if I see the world
in youthful guise
as it begins to clothe itself in green,
it is as if I see in unripe age
that beautiful young girl who’s
now a lady
;
and
once the sun has risen
warming things,
it seems that it is like
the
flame of love
that rules high in the heart;
but when the day laments
the
step by step retreating
of the sun,
I see her having
reached her perfect days
.
When I gaze
at the leaves upon a branch
or violets on the ground when cold grows less
and all
the better stars
have gained their force,
my eyes still see
the green and violets
with which
Love
at the outset of my war
was armed so that he drives me even now,
and that sweet lovely little
tender bark
that covers every tiny part of her
in which today there dwells the noble soul
that makes all other pleasure
