Love

Sonnet LI (In Death): His Passion Finds Its Only Consolation in Contemplating Her in Heaven

by Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch) 1304–1374

Translated by Major Macgregor (in Bohn, 1879) · From To Laura in Death

Love

My days more swiftly than the forest hind
Have fled like shadows, and no pleasure seen
Save for a moment, and few hours serene,
Whose bitter-sweet I treasure in true mind.
O wretched world, unstable, wayward! Blind
Whose hopes in thee alone have centred been;
In thee my heart was captived by her mien
Who bore it with her when she earth rejoin'd:
Her better spirit, now a deathless flower,
And in the highest heaven that still shall be,
Each day inflames me with its beauties more.
Alone, though frailer, fonder every hour,
I muse on her--Now what, and where is she,
And what the lovely veil which here she wore?

MLA

Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch). “Sonnet LI (In Death): His Passion Finds Its Only Consolation in Contemplating Her in Heaven.” Translated by Major Macgregor. Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/petrarch/318/.

Chicago

Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch). “Sonnet LI (In Death): His Passion Finds Its Only Consolation in Contemplating Her in Heaven.” Translated by Major Macgregor. Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/petrarch/318/.

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