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

Vaucluse

Vaucluse Has Become to Him a Scene of Pain

By Francesco Petrarca (1304–1374)

Petrarch’s Sonnets on Vaucluse. IV.
Translated by M. E. Wrottesley

TO every sound, save sighs, this air is mute,

When from rude rocks, I view the smiling land

Where she was born, who held my life in hand

From its first bud till blossoms turned to fruit:

To heaven she ’s gone, and I ’m left destitute

To mourn her loss, and cast around in pain

These wearied eyes, which, seeking her in vain

Where’er they turn, o’erflow with grief acute;

There ’s not a root or stone amongst these hills,

Nor branch nor verdant leaf midst these soft glades,

Nor in the valley flowery herbage grows,

Nor liquid drop the sparkling fount distils,

Nor savage beast that shelters in these shades,

But knows how sharp my grief, how deep my woes.