Love
Sonnet CXI (In Life): To One Who Spoke to Him of Laura
Translated by Major Macgregor (in Bohn, 1879) · From To Laura in Life
Whene'er you speak of her in that soft tone
Which Love himself his votaries surely taught,
My ardent passion to such fire is wrought,
That e'en the dead reviving warmth might own:
Where'er to me she, dear or kind, was known
There the bright lady is to mind now brought,
In the same bearing which, to waken thought,
Needed no sound but of my sighs alone.
Half-turn'd I see her looking, on the breeze
Her light hair flung; so true her memories roll
On my fond heart of which she keeps the keys;
But the surpassing bliss which floods my soul
So checks my tongue, to tell how, queen-like, there,
She sits as on her throne, I never dare.
Cite this poem
MLA
Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch). “Sonnet CXI (In Life): To One Who Spoke to Him of Laura.” Translated by Major Macgregor. Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/petrarch/142/.
Chicago
Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch). “Sonnet CXI (In Life): To One Who Spoke to Him of Laura.” Translated by Major Macgregor. Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/petrarch/142/.
Read this poem with the Codex →
More by Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch)
- Canzone X (In Life): In Praise of Laura's Eyes: in Them He Finds Every Good, and He Can Never Cease to Praise Them
- Sonnet CXVII (In Life): Dialogue of the Poet with His Heart
- Sonnet CLXXXVII (In Life): His Nights Are, Like His Days, Passed in Torment
- Sonnet XXVIII (In Death): He Glories in His Love
- Sonnet LXXV (Part II)