From the Canzoniere

From the Canzoniere Petrarch Translated by A. M. Juster (bio) 41 When it departs from its own home, the treethat Phoebus loved in human incarnationmakes Vulcan pant and drip with perspirationas he repairs Jove's bitter archery. He thunders, snows, then drenches equallyJanus and Caesar with precipitation;Earth weeps, the sun remains in isolation(since elsewhere there is his "dear friend" to see), then Mars and Saturn, savage stars, regaintheir boldness, and well-armed Orion shatterspoor sailors' ropes and tillers in the rain. Always tempestuous Aeolus battersNeptune and Juno, so we feel the painwhen the fair face that angels covet scatters. [End Page 65] 42 But now that her sweet smile, modest and shy,no longer hides its new resplendency,the geriatric smith of Sicilyfutilely hammers with his forge nearby, since handmade arms of war for Jove won't fly(though tempered at Mount Etna skillfully),and now his sister slowly seems to bereborn when fair Apollo casts an eye. A breeze is blowing from the shores out westthat saves a rookie sailor from his fears,and in lush fields stirs flowers from their rest. The spiteful stars escape from all the spheres,dispersing from a face so greatly blessed,through which it has already scattered tears. [End Page 66] 104 Desired courage, that once bloomed in youwhen Love began to stir you up to fight,is yielding fruit as much of a delightas flowers, and it makes my hope come true, thus my heart tells me that what I should doto raise your profile is on paper writedown words, because no marble bust, despiteits hardness, makes a person's life renew. Do you believe Marcellus, Scipio,Paulus, or Caesar ever gained their famedue to an anvil or a hammer's blow? My dear Pandolfo, their great works becamequite frail in time, though sharing what we knowgives men renown through an immortal name. [End Page 67] 130 Since mercy's road has been denied to me,I traveled far on a despairing wayfrom eyes where—by what fate I cannot say—there lies the prize for my fidelity. I feed my heart with sighs; it makes no pleafor more and, born to cry, I live each dayon tears without regret, for in dismaymy tears are sweeter than what others see. I hold one image, not by Phidias,Praxiteles, or Zeuxis, but from mymuch better master and a higher mind. What Libya or Scythia stays byme—glutted, exiled somewhere hideous—who, while hidden, Envy can still find? [End Page 68] 187 As Alexander sighed, he said while nearthe merciless Achilles' famous crypt,"O lucky man, who found a trumpet clearenough to praise you in his manuscript." Although this pure white dove, who has no peerthroughout the world whom she has not outstripped,roars feebly like me, she is hard to hear;the cards are dealt this way and can't be flipped, for she deserves the praise of Orpheusand Homer, and that shepherd still the sonof Mantua, and odes to spread her fame, yet fate and her skewed star, notoriousonly for this, entrusted her to onewho mangles, but adores, her gorgeous name. [End Page 69] 260 Beneath the stars I saw two gorgeous eyes,replete with sweetness and morality,so, near these love-nests of such gaiety,my bleak heart scorns all others that it spies. On foreign shores it's she who they most prizeacross all generations peerlessly,not she whose great desirabilitybrought Greece its woes and Troy its final cries, nor that attractive Roman who, with steel,slit her chaste, scornful breast, and not Argia,Polyxena, or Hysiphyle. Her excellence shows Nature's grand appeal.I may be wrong, but it's my best idea—though he who lumbers, then must quickly flee. [End Page 70] A. M. Juster A. M. Juster's ten books of original and translated poetry include Horace's Satires (University of Pennsylvania Press 2008), Tibullus' Elegies (Oxford University Press 2012), Saint Aldhelm's Riddles (University of Toronto Press 2016...

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