Love
Sonnet LXIX (In Life): He Paints the Beauties of Laura, Protesting His Unalterable Love
anonymous (in Bohn, 1879) · From To Laura in Life
Loose to the breeze her golden tresses flow'd
Wildly in thousand mazy ringlets blown,
And from her eyes unconquer'd glances shone,
Those glances now so sparingly bestow'd.
And true or false, meseem'd some signs she show'd
As o'er her cheek soft pity's hue was thrown;
I, whose whole breast with love's soft food was sown,
What wonder if at once my bosom glow'd?
Graceful she moved, with more than mortal mien,
In form an angel: and her accents won
Upon the ear with more than human sound.
A spirit heavenly pure, a living sun,
Was what I saw; and if no more 'twere seen,
T' unbend the bow will never heal the wound.
Cite this poem
MLA
Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch). “Sonnet LXIX (In Life): He Paints the Beauties of Laura, Protesting His Unalterable Love.” Translated by anonymous. Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/petrarch/89/.
Chicago
Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch). “Sonnet LXIX (In Life): He Paints the Beauties of Laura, Protesting His Unalterable Love.” Translated by anonymous. Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/petrarch/89/.
Read this poem with the Codex →
More by Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch)
- Sestina I (In Life): Night Brings Him No Rest. He is the Prey of Despair
- Sonnet LXXVII (In Life): He Sympathises with His Friend Orso at His Inability to Attend a Tournament
- Sonnet CXXXVIII (In Life): He Cannot End Her Cruelty, nor She His Hope
- Sonnet CCVII (In Life): The Two Roses
- Sonnet L (In Death): Under the Allegory of a Laurel He Again Deplores Her Death