Explore "In Quel Bel Viso, Ch' I' Sospiro E Bramo" by Francesco Petrarca on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
ON LAURA PUTTING HER HAND BEFORE HER EYES WHILE HE WAS GAZING ON HER.
On the fair face for which I long and sigh / Mine eyes were fasten'd with desire intense.
When, to my fond thoughts, Love, in best reply, / Her honour'd hand uplifting, shut me thence.
My heart there caught -- as fish a fair hook by, / Or as a young bird on a limed fence -- / For good deeds follow from example high, / To truth directed not its busied sense.
But of its one desire my vision reft, / As dreamingly, soon oped itself a way, / Which closed, its bliss imperfect had been left: / My soul between those rival glories lay, / Fill'd with a heavenly and new delight, / Whose strange surpassing sweets engross'd it quite.
MACGREGOR.