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Rotta è l’alta colonna e ’l verde lauro - Francesco Petrarch, Some Love Songs [1915]

Edition used:

Some Love Songs of Petrarch, translated and annotated with a Biographical Introduction by William Dudley Foulke (Oxford University Press, 1915).

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Rotta è l’alta colonna e ’l verde lauro

  • Broken the column tall and laurel green
  • That were my shade and my security,
  • And I have lost what shall no more be seen
  • From western ocean to the Indian sea.
  • ’Twas Death who from mine arms these treasures bore,
  • Wherewith I lived in joy and walked in pride,
  • And now no lands nor empires can restore
  • Nor gems nor gold allure them to my side.
  • If human will be ruled by destiny,
  • What else than bitter anguish can I choose
  • With downcast face and eyes suffused with tears?
  • That life of ours that is so fair to see,
  • How swiftly in one morning doth it lose
  • All that it won through many weary years!
  • cclxix

1348-9. Cochin, p. 126.

With the returning of another spring the memories of Laura awaken a new pang.