III.

CANZONE.

Ladies, and youths that in their favour bask,
With mocking smiles come round me: Prithee, why,
Why dost thou with an unknown language cope,
Love-riming? Whence thy courage for the task?
Tell us--so never frustrate be thy hope,
And the best thought still to thy thinking fly!
Thus me they mock: Thee other streams, they cry,
Thee other shores, another sea demands
Upon whose verdant strands
Are budding, even this moment, for thy hair
Immortal guerdon, bays that will not die:
An over-burden on thy back why bear?--
Song, I will tell thee; thou for me reply:
My lady saith--and her word is my heart--
This is Love's mother-tongue, and fits his part.


IV.

Diodati--and I muse to tell the tale--
This stubborn I, that Love was wont despise
And make a laughter of his snares, unwise,
Am fallen--where honest feet will sometimes fail.
Not golden tresses, not a cheek vermeil,
Dazzle me thus; but, in a new-world guise,
A foreign Fair my heart beatifies--