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A peerless flower grew in a fair field, breathed in my magnificent hopes, and once gave in return such sweet fragrance its seed, makes the bitter fruit reaped welcome and sweet. We cannot discern if life is good or evil until at death's door: when one pain is soothed, another takes over: our wretched state radically uncertain. But though time and chance alter many, I will not change: I will praise my master, and I will cry for my loss and wreckage. From a passion begun when I began, which will be no less sincere when I die: one inalienable faith has been born. |
An image of the Italian text from Visconti's 1840 edition |
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Notes: From V LXXX:80. See also B A1:58:32; R LXXIX:221-2. Translations: Jerrold 83, Gibaldi 37 Key |
