love poetry

WHEREIN HE RECALLS THE SAD SWEET SOUVENIRS OF LOVE

That window where my whole sun sets and rises
Forever dazzling, lending earth new lustres,
And that where still, when savage Boreas blusters
In the brief days, the gusts assume fierce guises;
That seat of stone where she soliloquizes
In solitude beneath the cypress clusters;
Haunts where her shadow gleamed; soft grass that musters
Proud memories of her radiant enterprises;
That spot where Love first wrought my overthrowing;
The sweet new season that, without relenting,

WHEREIN, HAVING ONCE FALLEN, HE IS FORCED TO THE ETERNAL SLAVERY OF LOVE

So, with perpetual expectation spent,
And in this lingering war of sighs defeated,
I scorn desires and hate the hopes repeated,
And loathe the fetters of my discontent;
But that pure face within my soul deep-seated,
Stamped there, with every motion evident,
Hedges me in, refuses to relent,
Proves incomplete an agony completed.
This marked my doom when liberty's hard highway
Was like another Eden barred with flame:

WHEREIN LOVE FORETELLS THE POET OF HIS RETURN TO LAURA AND POETRY

Write — so Love told my heart and often said —
Write what thou seest large in letters of gold,
That white as ashes is the flock I fold,
And in a moment made alive and dead.
Time was thy spirit felt my power spread
A public proof to lovers young and old;
When other passions found in thee a hold,
I soon caught up with thee, though thou hadst fled.
And if the eyes where first I stood revealed,
Those brilliant eyes where my sweet flag unfurled,

CONCERNING THE LAMENTABLE DEATH OF CINO DA PISTOIA

Weep, women, and with you weep Love as well!
Weep, lovers everywhere, a various throng!
Since he is dead, who while he lived had sung
So valiantly of Love! O ring his knell!
For me, my dear entreaties must compel
This cruel dolour not to check my tongue
Of its melodious tears nor make less long
The heart's moan that shall lighten the heart's hell.
Rhymes, weep, and verses, do you also weep!
Since Messer Cino, of love's fragrant line

WHEREIN HE CONDOLES WITH HIS BROTHER GHERARDO ON THE UNTIMELY DEATH OF A LADY HE LOVED

The lovely lady thou didst love so greatly
Hath from our midst too soon, too soon departed
To take her place among the splendid-hearted
Whose virtue shed such light upon us lately.
No human bliss or bane her station stately
Can touch or taint: come, stand again, new-started,
New-consecrated in God's path, new-charted
In the bright flight that speeds to Heaven so straightly!
Thus, from the heavier burden liberated,

WHEREIN HE EXALTS HER BEAUTY AND AVERS THE PERMANENCE OF HIS PASSION

Golden upon the wind her loose hair streaming,
Twisted into a thousand curls was shaken;
And from her eyes, which seldom now awaken
To answer mine, a fiery light was gleaming;
Ah! — was it fancy? — but with wistful seeming,
Her lovely face by pity's tint was taken:
What marvel that my heart, so long Love's beacon,
Should flame out, fueled so by Love's fierce dreaming?
She was no mortal in her stately moving,
But stepped an angel; and her accents glowing

WHEREIN HE INFORMS CERTAIN LADIES OF THE ADVANTAGES OF LOVE'S DURESS

Fleeing the prison where these many years
Love held me in a sort of heavenly hell, —
Ladies, the story were too long to tell,
How my new freedom crushed me with new fears:
My heart felt anguish fiercer than Love's tears;
Loveless, it could not live a day: then fell
Again on me that Traitor, masked so well
He had deceived a wiser than his peers.
Wherefore, with frequent sighs turning my soul
Back, I have cried, " Ah, Christ! the yoke and chains

WHEREIN HE EXHORTS LOVERS TO FLY FROM LOVE BETIMES

Since my hope takes too long upon the way
And life has all too short a time to stay,
I wish with all my heart I had perceived
Sooner, and fled as soon and swift away —
And fly I do, though I feel sore aggrieved
In my left side where Love his worst achieved;
But safe at last, though on my face his sway
Is plainly written — not to be retrieved.
Wherefore I warn you that yet walk his road,
Turn your blind steps aside; and ye inflamed

ON AN ANNIVERSARY, SEEING LAURA AT THE HOUR AND PLACE OF THEIR FIRST MEETING

Ever I loved, and love as much as ever,
And day by day shall only love the more
That lovely place where often I implore
Peace from Love's fierce and unremitting fever;
My mind is set to love the swords that sever
Vile passions from it, and the hour it tore
Away, and her whose face makes the heart soar,
Whose pure example points to high endeavour.
Who ever thought to see them all combine,
Now on this side, now that, my heart to storm —

WHEREIN, THOUGH NOT INVULNERABLE, HE REFUSES TO FEEL FURTHER TORMENT OF LOVE

Till winter's silver frost my temples harrow,
Where shade by shade Time mixes gray with grayer,
Danger will dog me still, ah grim gainsayer,
So long as Love keeps finger upon arrow.
Let Love his tortures practice on a sparrow!
I do not dread that treacherous trick-player:
My heart will not fly open for the slayer
To plant his blood-red barbs deep in its marrow!
Mine eyes are stones through which tears cannot blunder,