19. ‘Son animali al mondo de sí altera’

There are creatures in the world with such other

vision that it is protected from the full sun:

yet others, because the great light offends them

cannot move around until the evening falls:

and others with mad desire, that hope

perhaps to delight in fire, because it gleams,

prove the other power, that which burns:

alas, and my place is with these last.

I am not strong enough to gaze at the light

of that lady, and do not know how to make a screen

from shadowy places, or the late hour:

yet, with weeping and infirm eyes, my fate

leads me to look on her: and well I know

I wish to go beyond the fire that burns me.