Love

Sonnet XXXVI (In Life): Some Have Wept for Their Worst Enemies, but Laura Deigns Him Not a Single Tear

by Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch) 1304–1374

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

Love

He who for empire at Pharsalia threw,
Reddening its beauteous plain with civil gore,
As Pompey's corse his conquering soldiers bore,
Wept when the well-known features met his view:
The shepherd youth, who fierce Goliath slew,
Had long rebellious children to deplore,
And bent, in generous grief, the brave Saul o'er
His shame and fall when proud Gilboa knew:
But you, whose cheek with pity never paled,
Who still have shields at hand to guard you well
Against Love's bow, which shoots its darts in vain,
Behold me by a thousand deaths assail'd,
And yet no tears of thine compassion tell,
But in those bright eyes anger and disdain.

MLA

Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch). “Sonnet XXXVI (In Life): Some Have Wept for Their Worst Enemies, but Laura Deigns Him Not a Single Tear.” Translated by Major Macgregor. Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/petrarch/43/.

Chicago

Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch). “Sonnet XXXVI (In Life): Some Have Wept for Their Worst Enemies, but Laura Deigns Him Not a Single Tear.” Translated by Major Macgregor. Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/petrarch/43/.

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