How happy is the day
in which ancient things
are now by you shown and celebrated:
One sees because around us,
all friendly people
are assembled here:
We who spend our lives
in these woodlands and groves,
have also come here,
I, nymph, and we, shepherds,
and we sing together of our loves.

How much beauty,  grace and splendour
Was ever seen in a woman,
Fair angel, the entire heaven gave you
So much courtesy, so much value
That never reigned in a woman, never before.
Everything reigns  with pity and has its seat,
So much that everyone who sees you
Says that your gracious line and virtues,
The heavenly eyes,
The beautiful face and hair
Are all together of an Angel, with your name.

Spring, encircled with herbs
and with leaves garlanding her hair, was clothing
the hills and the countryside around with new beauty
and breathing sweet Arabian scents,
when at daybreak, Licori,
gathering purple flowers in his own hand,
told me, in recompense for all that desire:
“I pick them for you, and, look, I adorn you with them.”

And so, speaking sweetly,
he bound my hair; and thus he seized my heart
with such sweet force
that I wanted no other joy:
so now I will never stop looking at him with love,
never sigh or call for any other.

Even though when I leave you
I feel myself dying,
I would be glad to leave every hour, every moment;
I feel so much joy
from the life I renew in coming back:
and so a thousand thousand times a day
I want to leave you—
so sweet are my returnings.

The white and sweet swan
dies singing, and I,
weeping, reach the end of my life.
Strange and different fate,
that he dies disconsolate
and I die a blessed death,
which in dying fills me
full of joy and desire.
If in dying, were I to feel no other pain,
I would be content to die a thousand deaths a day.

Her savage bitter heart, and cruel will,
beneath a sweet, humble, angelic form,
however much they retain their severity,
gain slight honour from me as their prize:
when the flowers, the grasses and the leaves
are new born, and when they die again,
in broad day and darkest night, I weep on,
since fate, Love, and my lady bring me grief.

I only live on hope, remembering
I've seen a little water's constant flow
wear away marble and the solid stone.
No heart's so hard that tears, prayers,
love, can't sometimes move it,
no will so cold that it can't be warmed.

Liquid pearls from Love's eyes scattered
in reward for my ardor,
but, alas! my heart
burns from a fiercer flame;
Ah, it alone suffices,
that first ardent pain, to bring me death.

I would sing of love in so new a way
I would draw a thousand sighs
from that hard heart, and light a thousand
noble desires in that chill mind:
and I would see her often change expression,
and wet her eyes, and turn more pityingly,
like one who, when it's no use, repents
of other's suffering and her own error.

O happy eyes of mine, happy you,
you who are dear to my sun
because you bear the resemblance
of those eyes that were to him so sweet, and so guilty,
You, dear, you are happy,
and I am not, and to quench your desire,
I rush to gaze upon the waves, and to pine.

Alone and thoughtful, the emptiest fields
I'm measuring with my slow, tardy steps,
and with my eyes I'm running away
where not a single footstep is printed in the sand.
I can not find another possible shelter
to hide me from everybody's awareness,
because in all my acts, so lacking in joy,
it's easy to see, outside, how I'm burning inside;

therefore, I believe these mountains and beaches
and rivers and woods now know  how cruel
is my life, which is hidden to men.
But I can not find paths wild and rough enough
to force Love not to walk on my side:
He keeps on speaking with me, and I with him.

Gripped by sadness and that intense longing
which removes fear, this beautiful woman,
alone in the night, weak, humble, selfless
her only armor active soaring hope,
enters the tomb, cries, moans, and rocks, pays no
mind to angels, thinks nothing of herself,
trusting him wholly, she falls at His feet:
the heart which aches with love can know no fear.

The men chosen for this state of mind, this
grace, felt his presence like he were some ghost,
a fearful passing shadow to shut out.
And thus if we cannot infer falsehood
from truth, it is right to respect women for
an awakened, exalted, constant heart.

Cruel Amaryllis, who with your name
to love, alas, bitterly you teach;
Amaryllis, more than the white privet
pure, and more beautiful,
but deafer than the deaf asp,
and fiercer and more elusive;
since in speaking I offend you,
I shall die in silence.

Yet for me will cry out the hills and the mountains
and these woods, to which
so often your fair name
to resound I teach.
Weeping for me, the springs,
and murmuring, the winds,
will tell my laments;
In my face will speak
compassion and sorrow;
and if every other thing is silent, in the end,
will speak my dying,
and to you my death will tell of my suffering.

He who takes love as a joke
takes to playing with fire
which with its fake splendour
entices the eyes and burns the hearts

I surrender, Love, I surrender
to the injuries of the years.
I see the arms of time
arrayed against me,
I surrender, Love, I surrender.

So that the end result [of my loves]
is not disgraceful,
before I see myself vanquished
let Love negotiate terms for me.

The stronghold of my heart
has now completely lost
its exterior defenses;
to the bulkhead of the face
the reserves of eyesight are lost;
the armaments of my mouth
are laid low;
every strength is shaken
and I see preparation for the final assault
on the breach of my lined cheeks.

I surrender, Love, I surrender:
before I see myself vanquished
let Love negotiate terms for me.

Above all I want
the fuse of desire
to remain lit as I depart.
Hope, at least, carries
little baggage in the heart.
It is seemly for my courage
to exit the field with loaded barrels,
and memory has cause
to retain a small arsenal,
that only memory and I can see.

I surrender, Love, I surrender:
before I see myself vanquished
let Love negotiate terms for me.

Duty will retain the right
to march in ranks
with flying colors,
wherever it goes,
sounding trumpets, raising its banners:
Where I go I would like
to have a loyal escort.
Speak clearly and let it suffice,
that new disputes do not arise in the end,
for I see that the enemy is quarrelsome.

I surrender, Love, I surrender
to the injuries of the years:
arrayed against me
I see the arms of time;
I surrender, Love, I surrender.

"O Love
[...]
Where's the fidelity
That the deceiver promised?

[...]

"Make my love come back
As he used to be
Or kill me, so that
I will not suffer anymore."

[...]

"I don't want him to sigh any longer
But if he's far from me.
No! He will not make me suffer
Anymore, I swear!

He's proud
Because I languish for him.
Perhaps if I fly away from him
He will come to pray to me again.

If her eyes are more serene
Than mine,
O Love, she does not hold in her heart
A fidelity so pure as mine.

And you will not receive from those lips
Kisses as sweet as mine,
Nor softer. Oh, don't speak!
Don't speak! you know better than that!"