Love

Sonnet LXXIV (In Death): Reflecting That Laura is in Heaven, He Repents His Excessive Grief, and is Consoled

by Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch) 1304–1374

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

Love

Sorrow and Love encouraged my poor tongue,
Discreet in sadness, where it should not go,
To speak of her for whom I burn'd and sung,
What, even were it true, 'twere wrong to show.
That blessèd saint my miserable state
Might surely soothe, and ease my spirit's strife,
Since she in heaven is now domesticate
With Him who ever ruled her heart in life.
Wherefore I am contented and consoled,
Nor would again in life her form behold;
Nay, I prefer to die, and live alone.
Fairer than ever to my mental eye,
I see her soaring with the angels high,
Before our Lord, her maker and my own.

MLA

Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch). “Sonnet LXXIV (In Death): Reflecting That Laura is in Heaven, He Repents His Excessive Grief, and is Consoled.” Translated by Major Macgregor. Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/petrarch/346/.

Chicago

Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch). “Sonnet LXXIV (In Death): Reflecting That Laura is in Heaven, He Repents His Excessive Grief, and is Consoled.” Translated by Major Macgregor. Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/petrarch/346/.

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