WHEREIN LAURA'S EYES ENSHRINE THE MAXIMS OF PERFECTION

What woman longs for that illustrious fame
Jewelled with courage, mind and courtesy?
Let her on those bright eyes fix hers and see
My lovely foe, whom men my friend misname.
There let her learn with love of God to flame,
With honour glow, how native grace can be
More golden, and by what proud certainty
To touch the heaven that awaits her with acclaim.
The liquid converse that no pen may capture
Is there; the splendid silence and the pure
Act that defies the poet's purest rapture;

BURDEN OF FAIR WOMEN

In such a star I saw two bright eyes turning,
With so much worth and sweetness over-brimming,
That soon before those wells of Love my yearning
And tired heart could bear no lesser hymning:
None matched her, none in times and places dimming,
Of any for whose beauty men went burning;
Not even she whose lustre left Troy swimming
In blood and shattered Greece with her returning.
Nor yet the radiant Roman who, with dagger
Drinking her pure and outraged bosom, banished

WHEREIN HE IS LOATH TO REMEMBER WHERE HE HAS LEFT LAURA

I seek a life remote and solitary,
As the wild rivers, fields and forests know,
To escape the blind, to shun the sordid so,
Whereof the wise and virtuous are wary;
And were my wish my will, I would not tarry
Under this Tuscan blue where soft airs flow,
But, singing, up to hill-dark Sorga go,
And, sighing, in its sighs find sanctuary.
But ah, as ever hostile Destiny
Forces my footsteps where my grief discloses
Amid the mire my garland of proud roses:

WHEREIN LAURA'S UNEXPECTED SMILE OF WELCOME IS ALMOST TOO MUCH

Live sparks fell flashing from those wells of fire
On me so sweetly, fell in lighting flashes,
Welled from a heart whose eloquence abashes,
Poured softly from a heart whose sighs inspire:
Ah, the mere recollection warms desire
When memory moves: — I look — and her long lashes
Gleam with glad tears, and the gray lifeless ashes
That marked her scorn, some glow of grace acquire!
My soul in sorrow nurtured, set in pain,
(How great the force that custom soon possesses!)

OF LAURA COVERING HER EYES WITH HER HAND AGAINST HER GAZE

On that sweet face for which my sighs ascend
Mine eyes were fixed with fierce intensity,
When Love, to chastise such temerity,
Lifted her lovely hand — and made an end;
Lifted my heart, too — as might hook suspend
A fish, or as the lime the bird — so me:
For sense delights not in philosophy
And often will its own sweet death commend.
But of its object, then, my vision cheated,
As it were dreaming, forced an entrance soon,
Which, had it missed, its joy were incompleted:

WHEREIN HIS SOUL VISITS, BUT FAILS TO INTERRUPT, HER SLUMBER

If only time could some revenge obtain me
From her whose every word and glance decried me,
Who then, with sorrier tactics to deride me,
Escapes and veils her eyes, the more to pain me —
So cruel — and yet so sweet! Ah, she will drain me,
Exhaust my spirit, tear the soul inside me,
Rage like a lion in my heart to chide me
From sleep and to the clamorous night constrain me!
My soul, expelled from slumber's drowsy dwelling,
Left its warm cell and rushed forth disencumbered

WHEREIN, UNLIKE THE GENERAL RUN OF LOVERS, HE PREFERS THE MORNING

They hate the dawn, they hunger for the twilight,
These lovers rapt in bright tranquillity;
But nightfall aggravates my misery;
My brighter moment blossoms with the shy light
Of dawn, when Nature's flaming light and my light,
My Laura, both arise and both agree
In lustre and in loveliness... And see!
Heaven hangs on Earth, blending his brilliant high light
With Earth's gray! As when bursts in quick green fire
That Laurel, now so rooted in my soul,

WHEREIN, LACKING NEWS OF HER, HE IS HEARTSICK WITH FEAR

Still must I listen — still no tidings hear
Of that too lovely, too loved enemy:
What think or what declare perplexes me,
So hope exalts, so sinks my heart with fear.
Her beauty is her peril; none is peer
To her high chastity: such grace hath she
God seeks to snatch earth's purest, it may be,
That the blue bubble of His atmosphere
May boast a new star, a new sun ascended.
And if my dread be proved, then life's long ravage
Dies with life's short repose. O absence savage!

WHEREIN HE SIGHS FOR THOSE VARIOUS CHARMS FROM WHICH A PERVERSE FORTUNE EVER PLEASES TO ABSENT HIM

O looks angelical! O words as sweet!
Shall I behold you, hear you once again?
O golden tresses, Love's most golden chain!
O leaden heart trapped in their golden net!
O glorious face whose magic charms beset
My tortured soul to trammel and detain!
O dear delusion! O conceit as vain
To hug the spear's head with my own wounds wet!
If those her eyes vouchsafe a liquid beam
(Eyes where my soul, my thoughts, forever dwell)

WHEREIN HIS PASSIONATE DESIRE TO SEE HER AGAIN IS AGGRAVATED BY THE DREAD HE MAY NEVER SEE HER MORE

In doubt of my own state, I weep, I sing,
I hope, I shudder, and with rhymes and sighs
Relax my load, while Love new pressure plies,
Subjects my heart to sterner suffering.
Will ever again her pure sweet image bring
Their early light to these abysmal eyes?
Alas, what can I hope or what devise
To shun the jealous shade of sorrow's wing?
For heaven, whose accolade it merits well,
It is indifferent to their earthly fate,