142. ‘A la dolce ombra de le belle frondi’ (Sestina)

Into the sweet shade of the lovely leaves

I ran fleeing from the pitiless light,

burning down on me from the third heaven:

and snow was already clearing from the hills

in the loving breeze that brought the new season,

and flowers to the fields, grass, and branches.

The world has never seen such graceful branches,

the wind has never stirred such emerald leaves

as were shown to me in that first season:

such that, trembling with the fierce light,

I did not turn for refuge to shadowed hills,

but to the tree that’s noblest in heaven.

A laurel protected me from that heaven,

so that I’ve often, longing for lovely branches,

made my way through the woods and hills:

but never found a tree or leaves

so honoured by the supreme light,

that they do not alter with the season.

So, more constant, season after season,

I follow where I heard the call from heaven

and guided by a clear and gentle light,

I turn, devoted, to those first branches

when the earth is scattered with leaves

and when the sun brings green to the hills.

Woods, stones, fields, rivers and hills:

whatever is, is altered by the season:

so that I ask a pardon of these leaves,

if in the many circling years of heaven

I thought I could flee the clinging branches

as soon as I began to see the light.

I was so pleased at first by the light

that I passed with delight among vast hills,

so I might be near the beloved branches:

now the brief life, the place, and the season

show me another path to climb to heaven

and bear fruit not only flowers and leaves.

I seek another love, and leaves and light,

another path to heaven from other hills,

since it is the season, and other branches.