151. ‘Non d’atra et tempestosa onda marina’

No weary helmsman ever fled for harbour

from the dark and tempestuous ocean waves,

as I do from gloomy and turbid thought,

fleeing where my great passion spurs me on.

Never has divine light overcome mortal vision

as did that sublime beam mine, that

of the beautiful, sweet, gentle, black and white

eyes in which Love gilds and sharpens his arrows.

He is not blind yet, but I see him with his quiver:

naked, except in so much as shame is veiled:

a boy with wings: not painted, but alive.

From this he shows me what he hides from others,

what I read, little by little, in her beautiful eyes,

all that I speak of Love, and all that I write.