Petrarch (80 page)

The persona Petrarch assumes is that of the disaffected lover playing buffoon, who
makes himself the object of amusement while directing his barbs at very different
targets. The canzone echoes the Bible, particularly the teachings of Paul and Proverbs.

1.
I never want to sing:
The proverb is Tuscan and means he has lost the desire to enchant.

2.
no one understood me:
Cf. 1.9–11. The true meaning of his love poetry had been misinterpreted.

3.
in a lovely place:
In her presence.

5–6.
It is snowing… and day is getting close:
Cf. Dante,
Convivio
IV, 7, 60: “Nevato è sì che tutto copre la neve.” Cf. Rom. 13:11.

9.
who looks:
Laura has taken a virtuous, detached stance.

11.
Love rules:
An old proverb.

12.
let him turn back:
Redire in viam
is a Latin proverb. Cf. 54.10.

15.
let him now:
One paraphrase would be, “He who can’t do as he wishes, does as he can.”

nice glass:
Clear truth will suffice.

16.
but no longer:
Cf. 95.12.

18.
Bad tribute:
A proverb from a feudal system that exacted heavy payment to the Lord. In 101.8,
“tribute” meant the poet’s tears.

19.
I get free:
Mi spetro
(unrock myself).

20.
I hear:
He “heard” perhaps from his own canzone, 23.49–80. Phaeton rebelled against Zeus,
the temporal power.

21.
blackbird:
A saying meaning that spring has come and gone. The term also applies to members
of the opposing party, in this case the Blacks.

23.
a rock amid the waves:
Cf. the
scogli
of poem 80. He seems to address those (or the one) who scorned him in line 2.

24.
nor birdlime:
One of Love’s many snares.

25.
excessive pride:
Cf. line 10.
Bella
is contrasted with
amorosa.
Excessive pride is inimical to virtue.

27–30.
some answer … :
Here he describes himself in his transformations.

29–30.
and some … :
He and other unfortunate lovers.

31.
out of style:
An ironic dissent.

34.
A humble lady:
Cf. 23.104–105. There is a time for humility and a time for boldness.

35.
A fig:
A version of the truism that you canot tell a book by its cover. “Fig” is a disparaging
term for a female and the essence of sweetness.

36.
things that are too hard:
It’s better not to bite off more than you can chew, as the saying goes.

37.
good dwelling places:
Suggestive of other women. This saying is linked with line 13 and both are drawn
together in line 80.

38.
can kill someone:
Cf. line 20.

39.
joined the dance:
The “dance” is figurative for worldly activity.

40.
That little left:
The worldly life he has left.

43.
shelters in the woods:
This God is merciful and offers the erring believer protection and solace on the
path to redemption.

45.
step by step:
“Lead me to graze” (
a passo
).

46.
don’t understand:
Faith is not found in books, nor true knowledge in the appearance of things.

47.
who sets the net:
Cf. Prov. 1:17 “Frusta autem iacitur rete ante oculos penatorum.”

48.
who is too subtle:
To break your head over subtleties is to overlook the simplicity of God’s truth.
Cf. 2 Cor. 3.

49.
Let not:
A legal term, “contractus non debet claudicare.” Cf. Gal. 3:23.

50.
one descends:
Into life in order to gain knowledge—a Neoplatonic concept derived from Orphic beginnings.

52.
a hidden beauty:
The
amoroso pensiero
that converts him from a cynical voyeur to a loving man.

53.
blessèd be the key:
Petrarch turns the canzone on this line, moving from subtlety to song.

54.
and shook it from:
Not the primal events but a response to a glance she seems to have turned on him
in reaction to his words.

57.
another grieves:
The style of these two lines recalls the poetry of Pier della Vigna, a member of
the Sicilian school who wove similar elegant conceits. Cf. Dante,
Inferno
XIII, 58–60.

60.
no more, yet it’s no less:
Inexhaustible but sweet. Cf. 23.4

61.
In silence:
In solitude.

62.
sound:
Of her words being uttered.

63.
dark prison:
Love.

64.
nocturnal violets:
Emblems of virginity and sacrifice.

65.
wild animals:
Cf. 56.7–8, “And in my sheepfold what wild beast is roaring? / Between the grain
and hand what wall exists?”

68.
where it is:
Vaucluse, but more specifically, in his poetry.

69.
love and jealousy:
The first use of the word “jealousy.”

75.
while I wear these clothes:
As long as he lives.

76–90.
I weep … :
The final stanza gathers up this network of concepts linking his faith. No congedo
is necessary.

77.
in what I hear:
Her sweet words.

78.
I enjoy and wait for better:
Like a wise Solomon standing back from the fray and passing his knowledge on to the
younger generation.

79.
I’m silent and cry out:
Two contrasting biblical injunctions, the one meaning to be silent about evil while
listening to the teachings of wisdom, the other to voice a general lamentation as
an expression of the people’s pain.

80.
on a good branch:
He rests above warring elements. He refers to the Cross here as well as to the laurel.

81.
the great refusal:
His turning to God.

82.
the base affect:
The jealousy of line 49 that drove him to crave possession of her.

86.
bold enough:
Cf. line 36. He has resolved to tell the truth, to stand out, to whatever end.

In the first madrigal in the
Canzoniere
(poem 52), Laura appears as a shepherdess; in the second (poem 54), as a pilgrim.
Here she descends from the sky as an angel.

2.
desended:
As a soul descending into corporeality. The “quick wings” of line 1 imply sagacity.

to the fresh shore:
Some take this to be a riverbank in Vaucluse, but metaphorically, on the threshold
of his new life.

3.
all alone:
The miraculous and the predestined are joined in this tercet.

4.
with no friend and no guide:
Like Beatrice descending to aid Dante, she is responding to his need for spiritual
guidance.

5.
a trap that she had woven:
Ordire
(to weave) has a figurative sense of “scheming.” She is beautiful by design.

out of silk:
The subtlest fabric, full of lights and shadows.

6.
within the grass:
A new, fresh growth of hope implicit in “greened.”

7.
I was not unhappy:
His memory has sweetened.

8.
light came spreading:
As a gradual revelation.

This begins a series of twelve sonnets encompassing the passing of the year 1341–1342,
as this sonnet commemorates the fifteenth year of his love and poem 118 the sixteenth.
The twelve were written in different periods over a span of about six years when Petrarch
spent considerable time in Vaucluse. Zingarelli believed that the series expresses
feelings of anticlimax that Petrarch suffered after his coronation as poet laureate
in 1341.

2.
have fought me:
In an inner war with himself.

5–6.
loving rays/that night:
Cf. 106.8, “the sweetest light.”

11.
light lit from it:
Cf. Dante,
Purgatorio
XXII, 10–12: “Love, / kindled by virtue, always kindles love, / if the first flame
is clearly visible.”

12.
laurel tree:
Such a wealth of hope and glory has sprung from the first poet. Cf. Dante,
Purgatorio
XXI, 94–96.

such forests flourish:
With the spread of language and culture, like a vast root system. Cf. Virgil,
Georgics
IV, 273: “Namque uno ingentem tollit de cespite silvam.”

13.
my foe:
Love leads him to deeper and deeper researches.

14.
can lead me:
By means of grace and beauty.

The sonnet is addressed to Sennuccio del Bene through the medium of the beloved terrain
where Petrarch first saw Laura. Sennuccio, an older Florentine poet who fled into
exile in 1311, lived for a time in Avignon. He and Petrarch were close friends, and
poems 112, 133, 144, and 287, all of them sonnets, are also addressed to him, the
last on the occasion of his death in 1349.

1.
More fortunate:
By destiny and miraculous happenstance. Cf. 106.1–4.

2.
Love stop in her steps:
He saw the action of love in the eyes she turned on him.

4.
clear peace:
The effect of the emerging sun that clears the sky.

5.
solid diamond:
Beauty cut from time.

8.
fills my heart:
Cf. 72.43.

9.
I shall see you:
Avignon and its environs.

10.
bend to seek:
With reverence.

12.
a noble heart:
That of Sennuccio, also a love poet.

13.
beg of my Sennuccio:
He asks the land to touch his friend with the same inspiration he has experienced—a
gracious way of requesting a poem or two from Sennuccio.

Poem 107 began this cycle of twelve sonnets with a centering of his mind in the earthly
place where he first saw Laura.

3.
those burning sparks:
Cf. 70.37. Castelvetro (1582) related these sparks to the four of poem 165, consisting
of her walk, glance, words, and gestures.

4.
fire… immortal:
Memories are like embers continually renewing his fire.

5.
I calm myself:
With solitude and contemplation.

6.
vespers, dawn:
The sequence of 2, 3, 1, 4 in the canonical hours is repeated in the action of the
poem, whose four parts seem to make four seasons of his “day,” summer, autumn, spring,
and winter, by evoking noon, evening, dawn, and curfew.

8.
I think of nothing else:
He focuses on the beauty of their effects.

9–11.
The gentle aura … :
Cf. Dante,
Purgatorio
XXVII, 91–117.

13.
forever in that air:
In Dante’s
Purgatorio
XXVII the air of the Earthly Paradise moves constantly; it “strikes and makes the
dense leaves of the forest sing” and is “pregnant with its special power.” Petrarch’s
sonnet provides a gloss on Dante’s imagery.

The sonnet illuminates the fearful and mysterious connection between himself and the
divine Laura. Both this and the next sonnet speak of the meaning of her greeting,
as Dante spoke of the greeting of Beatrice in the
Vita nuova.

1.
to that same place:
Of contemplation.

3.
all of my old thoughts:
Those of love, defending him against doubt. Cf. 111.3.

5.
I turned:
Cf. Rev. 1:12: “Et conversus sum, at viderem vocem, quae loquebatur mecum.”

saw a shadow:
Her living form, shadow of her mortality.

6.
stamped by the sun:
As if imprinted on the earth by the powerful light behind it.

7.
that it was she:
The divine Laura.

8.
godly state:
Cf. 106.1–2.

12.
as lightning comes:
As thunder follows lightning by a few seconds, God’s judgment is revealed in the
prophecies. Cf. Rev. 8:5.

Fear of death and God’s swift judgment are quickly forgotten when he considers the
lady’s lovely self and greeting.

1.
in her eyes bears my heart:
She has recognized love in his eyes and responded in kind.

3.
lovely thoughts of love:
Cf. 110.4.

5.
in such condition:
She interprets his pallor not as ardor but as piety, and so she does not disdain
him.

6.
with color so astounding:
Fresh, young, and new—the color of the glad maiden.

8.
drop all his arms:
The disarming qualities of Laura would be sufficient to bring peace to the land.

13.
reconsidering her greeting:
In
Vita nuova
III, Dante describes the effect of Beatrice’s greeting in prose. Petrarch thinks
it over in song.

14.
I feel no pain:
Cf. Plotinus’s “Intellective Act,” in the full experience of which the soul is immune
from care and trouble. See also 105.60, “I feel no more yet it’s no less than ever”;
and poem 12, line 3.