At my past loss I weep by turns and smile,
    Because my faith is fix’d in what I hear. 
    The present I enjoy and better wait;
    Silent, I count the years, yet crave their end,
    And in a lovely bough I nestle so
    That e’en her stern repulse I thank and praise,
    Which has at length o’ercome my firm desire,
    And inly shown me, I had been the talk,
    And pointed at by hand:  all this it quench’d. 
    So much am I urged on,
    Needs must I own, thou wert not bold enough. 
    Who pierced me in my side she heals the wound,
    For whom in heart more than in ink I write;
    Who quickens me or kills,
    And in one instant freezes me or fires.

    ANON.

[Footnote R:  This, the only known version, is included simply from a wish to represent the original completely, the poem being almost untranslateable into English verse.  Italian critics are much divided as to its object.  One of the most eminent (Bembo) considers it to be nothing more than an unconnected string of proverbs.]

MADRIGALE III.

Nova angeletta sovra l’ ale accorta.

HE ALLEGORICALLY DESCRIBES THE ORIGIN OF HIS PASSION.

      From heaven an angel upon radiant wings,
    New lighted on that shore so fresh and fair,
    To which, so doom’d, my faithful footstep clings: 
    Alone and friendless, when she found me there,
    Of gold and silk a finely-woven net,
    Where lay my path, ’mid seeming flowers she set: 
    Thus was I caught, and, for such sweet light shone
    From out her eyes, I soon forgot to moan.

    MACGREGOR.

SONNET LXXXIV.

Non veggio ove scampar mi possa omai.

AFTER FIFTEEN YEARS HER EYES ARE MORE POWERFUL THAN AT FIRST.

      No hope of respite, of escape no way,
    Her bright eyes wage such constant havoc here;
    Alas! excess of tyranny, I fear,
    My doting heart, which ne’er has truce, will slay: 
    Fain would I flee, but ah! their amorous ray,
    Which day and night on memory rises clear,
    Shines with such power, in this the fifteenth year,
    They dazzle more than in love’s early day. 
    So wide and far their images are spread
    That wheresoe’er I turn I alway see
    Her, or some sister-light on hers that fed. 
    Springs such a wood from one fair laurel tree,
    That my old foe, with admirable skill,
    Amid its boughs misleads me at his will.

    MACGREGOR.

SONNET LXXXV.

Avventuroso piu d’ altro terreno.

HE APOSTROPHIZES THE SPOT WHERE LAURA FIRST SALUTED HIM.