Love
Sonnet CCIII (In Life): His Sorrow for the Illness of Laura Increases, Not Lessens, His Flame
Translated by Major Macgregor (in Bohn, 1879) · From To Laura in Life
The sovereign Lord, 'gainst whom of no avail
Concealment, or resistance is, or flight,
My mind had kindled to a new delight
By his own amorous and ardent ail:
Though his first blow, transfixing my best mail
Were mortal sure, to push his triumph quite
He took a shaft of sorrow in his right,
So my soft heart on both sides to assail.
A burning wound the one shed fire and flame,
The other tears, which ever grief distils,
Through eyes for your weak health that are as rills.
But no relief from either fountain came
My bosom's conflagration to abate,
Nay, passion grew by very pity great.
Cite this poem
MLA
Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch). “Sonnet CCIII (In Life): His Sorrow for the Illness of Laura Increases, Not Lessens, His Flame.” Translated by Major Macgregor. Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/petrarch/240/.
Chicago
Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch). “Sonnet CCIII (In Life): His Sorrow for the Illness of Laura Increases, Not Lessens, His Flame.” Translated by Major Macgregor. Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/petrarch/240/.
Read this poem with the Codex →
More by Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch)
- Sonnet LIII (In Life): Fleeing from Love, He Falls into the Hands of His Ministers
- Sestina V (In Life): He Tells the Story of His Love, Resolving Henceforth to Devote Himself to God
- Sonnet CLXXIX (In Life): She Unites in Herself the Highest Excellences of Virtue and Beauty
- Sonnet XXIV (In Death): His Lyre is Now Attuned Only to Woe
- Sonnet XC (In Death): The Plaintive Song of a Bird Recalls to Him His Own Keener Sorrow