Dolci ire, dolci sdegni et dolci paci, dolce mal, dolce affanno et dolce peso, dolce parlare, et dolcemente inteso, or di dolce òra, or pien di dolci faci:
5alma, non ti lagnar, ma soffra et taci, et tempra il dolce amaro, che n’à offeso, col dolce honor che d’amar quella ài preso a cui io dissi: Tu sola mi piaci.
Forse anchor fia chi sospirando dica, 10tinto di dolce invidia: Assai sostenne per bellissimo amor quest’al suo tempo.
Altri: O fortuna agli occhi miei nemica, perché non la vid’io? perché non venne ella piú tardi, over io piú per tempo?
***
Sweet anger, sweet disdain and sweet peace, sweet ills, sweet troubles, and sweet burdens, sweet speech, and sweetly understood, now with sweet fire, now filled with sweet airs:
soul, don’t complain, but suffer in silence, and temper the sweet bitterness that hurt you with the sweet honour loving her has brought you to whom I say: ‘You alone please me.’
Perhaps someone will one day say sighing, blushing with sweet envy: ‘In his time this man suffered for the greatest of loves.’
Another: ‘O fortune, inimical to my eyes, why did I not see her? Why was she not born later, or I, much earlier, in her time?’