English

AGAINST THE CORRUPTIONS OF THE COURT OF ROME

Fountain of sorrow, inn of cursed ire,
College of error, temple of heresy,
Cistern of greed and insatiety,
Rome erstwhile, now the Babylon whore of hire!
Cesspool of lies, O dungeon full of fire,
Where truth is compost to idolatry,
Hell upon earth, it shall go wondrously
If Christ pile not thy scarlet on the pyre!
Founded in want and honour unpolluted,
Against thy founders pointest thou thy horn,
Impudent Jezebel? Is thy faith rooted

WHEREIN HE PROPHESIES TO ROME THE ADVENT OF SOME GREAT POPE-PALADIN WHO WILL RESTORE HER TO HER ANCIENT VIRTUE AND GLORY

Covetous Babylon, of Heaven so hated,
Has by her sins now drained the brimming flagon,
Her knees now bend to Baal and hideous Dagon,
Pallas and Jove are fouled and Bacchus fêted.
Though against hope I hope, though desecrated,
Yet shall another Priest-King slay the Dragon,
Smite the Gold Bull and break the garlanded Wagon,
Turn faith to God, to Rome turn re-created.
Her idols shall be shattered, in the dust

WHEREIN HE RAILS AGAINST THE CORRUPTIONS OF THE ROMAN COURT

Rain fire from Heaven down upon thy head,
Thou breaker of Christ, thou Babylonian whore,
Grown fat and rich with making many poor,
Gloating in vice, despising simple bread!
Thou nest of treason where the soul is fed
Of malice and of wormy mischief more
Than pen or tongue may tell, thy stock and store
Is wine and huge sloth on a harlot's bed!
Graybeards and strumpets in thy chambers dance;
There staggers Belzebub, thy loathsome lord,

WHEREIN HE EXPATIATES UPON LOVE'S PARADOXES

I find no peace, yet from all wars abstain me;
I fear, I hope, I burn — and straightway wizen;
I mount above the wind, yet stay unrisen;
Grasp the world — thus — yet nothing does it gain me.
Love neither lets me go, nor will detain me;
Gives me no leave, nor yet keeps me in prison:
I am not held, and yet the hard chain is on
The heart; he yields no death, yet will he chain me.
Sightless, I see; and without tongue, I sorrow;
I cling to life, and yet would gladly perish;

WHEREIN HE ENUMERATES THE WEAPONS IN LOVE'S ARSENAL

Love uses me as target for his lance,
As snow in sunlight or as wax in flame,
Or wind-swept cloud; and though upon your name
I call, O Laura, pity looks askance.
Your flashing eyes first caused the dart to dance
In my sick breast; nor time nor place can tame
Its fire. From you, that take no thought of blame,
Were born the pangs that thwart deliverance.
Each thought drives arrows, and your face a sun,
My passion's heat: and these Love urges well

WHEREIN HE TELLS THE COURSE OF TRUE LOVE

If this should not be Love, O God, what shakes me?
If Love it is, what strange, what rich delight!
If Love be kind, why has it fangs to bite?
If cruel, why so sweet the barb that rakes me?
If Love I crave, why this lament that breaks me?
If not, what tears or sighs can mend my plight?
O Death in Life, dear pain, where lies thy might
If I refuse the doom that overtakes me?
If I consent, without a cause I grieve:
So in a tempest do my fortunes heave,

IN REPLY TO A SONNET OF JACOPO DA LENIINO

I would sing Love in music apt and new,
And bruise her hard heart into sigh on sigh,
And set her frozen mind to flaming high
With ardour; as each time she heard me sue,
Over her face would pass in swift review
Many a change; and tears in each proud eye,
Like one who grieves too late for memory
Of his own error and another's rue;
I would remark fresh roses in that snow
Rise with her breath — that ivory barrier
Which turns to marble whoso looks on her;

WHEREIN SELF-BANISHMENT AFFORDS NO RETREAT FROM ENVY

Since pity is a barred and bolted door,
And paths as pitiless our lives divide,
Obscuring her from me, the unsatisfied
And all but unrewarded servitor,
My heart on sighs I nourish and restore,
With the black bread of anguish well supplied;
Yet those that see me spent and hollow-eyed
Guess not the sweetness at the sorrow's core.
Your portrait, where mine eyes obtain sole peace,
No Zeuxis pencilled nor Praxiteles,
But a hand bolder, with more skill contrived.

WHEREIN HE RECOUNTS THE CAUSES OF HIS WOE

Love, Fortune, and my melancholy state,
Despising what is present by what's past,
So plague my soul that on the dead I cast
Thoughts envious of the peace they contemplate.
Love tears my heart; Fortune, more obstinate,
Afflicts me without pause, until at last,
Worn out by ills as vigilant as vast,
To constant warfare I submit my fate.
Nor do I hope for happier days again,
But tinge the future a more turbulent tint;
Spring is no more — summer is on the wane:

UPON HIS LEAVE-TAKING

That touching pallor which, like a soft cloud
Veiled her sweet smile, so delicate, so dear,
So shook my heart that from its stricken sphere
It sought to rise and meet that lovely shroud.
Then felt I how the blessed lovers crowd
About each other with eyes fixed and near:
For never was a mortal's gaze so clear,
So perfect and so tenderly endowed.
The gentlest glance ever a woman threw
Upon her love were cold and lustreless
Against this look that like celestial dew