Explore "To Italy" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
By Vincenzo Da Filicaja
Italy! Italy! thou who'rt doomed to wear / The fatal gift of beauty, and possess / The dower funest of infinite wretchedness / Written upon thy forehead by despair; / Ah! would that thou wert stronger, or less fair. / That they might fear thee more, or love thee less, / Who in the splendor of thy loveliness / Seem wasting, yet to mortal combat dare! / Then from the Alps I should not see descending / Such torrents of armed men, nor Gallic horde / Drinking the wave of Po, distained with gore, / Nor should I see thee girded with a sword / Not thine, and with the stranger's arm contending, / Victor or vanquished, slave forever more.