331. ‘Solea de la Fontana di mia vita’

I used to wander far from the fountain

of my life, and search land and sea,

not as I wished, but following my star:

and always as I went, Love aided me,

in those exiles where bitterness is seen,

feeding my heart on hope and memory.

Now alas, I lift my hands in surrender

to my evil and violent destiny

that deprives me of that sweet hope.

Only memory is left,

and I feed desire on that alone:

so the soul might be less weak and lean.

As a runner on the way, if he lacks food,

is forced to slow his course,

losing the strength that gave him speed,

so, lacking dear nourishment

in my weary life, and bitten by death

that denuded the world and saddened my heart,

sweet bitterness, and lovely painful pleasure

so alter me from hour to hour, that I hope

and fear I will not complete the brief road.

I escape being a cloud or dust in the wind,

in order to no longer be a wanderer:

and so be it, if death is my fate.

But this mortal life never pleased me

(as Love knows with whom I often speak)

except through her who was his light and mine:

and since that spirit through whom I lived,

dying on earth, was reborn in heaven, the height

of my longing is (and let it be!) to follow her.

But it always grieved me deeply, since

I was unable to foresee my state,

that Love showed it me in those lovely eyes

to give me noble counsel:

for some have died disconsolate and sad,

who earlier might have died in blessedness.

In those eyes where my heart used to live

till my harsh fate became invidious,

and banished it from so rich a dwelling,

Love had described, with his own hand

in words of pity, what would happen

soon to my desire, so long on its journey.

It would have been a sweet and lovely death

if in dying my life had not died wholly,

rather I’d gone on living as my better part:

now my hopes are scattered

by Death, and a little earth weighs down my good:

and I live on: and never think of it without fear.

If my little intellect had stayed with me,

when needed, and other desires had not

sent it straying on another road,

I might have read in my lady’s look:

‘You’ve reached the end of all your sweetness

and the beginning of your great bitterness.’

Understanding that, sweetly freed

in her lifetime from my mortal veil

and this harmful burden of the flesh,

I might have gone before her,

to see her throne prepared in heaven:

now I follow after, with whitened hair.

Song, if you find a man at peace with love,

say: ‘Die while you’re happy,

since early death is no grief, but a refuge:

and he who can die well, should not delay.’