Petrarch - Sestina VII lyrics

HE DESPAIRS OF ESCAPE FROM THE TORMENTS BY WHICH HE IS SURROUNDED Nor Ocean holds such swarms amid his waves, Not overhead, where circles the pale moon, Were stars so numerous ever seen by night, Nor dwell so many birds among the woods, Nor plants so many clothe the field or hill, As holds my tost heart busy thoughts each eve. Each day I hope that this my latest eve Shall part from my quick clay the sad salt waves, And leave me in last sleep on some cold hill; So many torments man beneath the moon Ne'er bore as I have borne; this know the woods Through which I wander lonely day and night. For never have I had a tranquil night, But ceaseless sighs instead from morn till eve, Since love first made me tenant of the woods: The sea, ere I can rest, shall lose his waves, The sun his light shall borrow from the moon, And April flowers be blasted o'er each hill. Thus, to myself a prey, from hill to hill, Pensive by day I roam, and weep at night, No one state mine, but changeful as the moon; And when I see approaching the brown eve, Sighs from my bosom, from my eyes fall waves, The herbs to moisten and to move the woods. Hostile the cities, friendly are the woods To thoughts like mine, which, on this lofty hill, Mingle their murmur with the moaning waves, Through the sweet silence of the spangled night, So that the livelong day I wait the eve, When the sun sets and rises the fair moon. Would, like Endymion, 'neath the enamour'd moon, That slumbering I were laid in leafy woods, And that ere vesper she who makes my eve, With Love and Luna on that favour'd hill, Alone, would come, and stay but one sweet night, While stood the sun nor sought his western waves. Upon the hard waves, 'neath the beaming moon, Song, that art born of night amid the woods, Thou shalt a rich hill see to-morrow eve! Macgregor.