Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
France: Vols. IX–X. 1876–79.

Vaucluse

He Leaves Vaucluse, but His Spirit Remains There with Laura

By Francesco Petrarca (1304–1374)

THE LOVED hills where I left myself behind,

Whence ever ’t was so hard my steps to tear,

Before me rise; at each remove I bear

The dear load to my lot by Love consigned.

Often I wonder inly in my mind,

That still the fair yoke holds me, which despair

Would vainly break, that yet I breathe this air;

Though long the chain, its links but closer bind.

And as a stag, sore struck by hunter’s dart,

Whose poisoned iron rankles in his breast,

Flies and more grieves the more the chase is pressed,

So I, with Love’s keen arrow in my heart,

Endure at once my death and my delight,

Racked with long grief, and weary with vain flight.