No Escape From Love.

Non posso altra figura.


I cannot by the utmost flight of thought
        Conceive another form of air or clay,
        Wherewith against thy beauty to array
        My wounded heart in armour fancy-wrought:
For, lacking thee, so low my state is brought,
        That Love hath stolen all my strength away;
        Whence, when I fain would halve my griefs, they weigh
        With double sorrow, and I sink to nought.
Thus all in vain my soul to scape thee flies,
        For ever faster flies her beauteous foe:
        From the swift-footed feebly run the slow!
Yet with his hands Love wipes my weeping eyes,
        Saying, this toil will end in happy cheer;
        What costs the heart so much, must needs be dear!

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni was an Italian sculptor, painter, architect, and poet of the High Renaissance. Born on March 6, 1475, he is widely considered one of the greatest artists of all time. His poetry, although lesser-known compared to his other artistic achievements, displays his deep contemplation of art, love, and spirituality. Michelangelo passed away on February 18, 1564.

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni

On Rome In The Pontificate Of Julius II.

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni, Simple Poetry

Light And Darkness.

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni, Simple Poetry

On Dante Alighieri.

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni, Simple Poetry

A Prayer For Grace In Death. First Reading.

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni, Simple Poetry

English

Suggested Poems

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Love's Dilemma.

I' mi credetti.


I deemed upon that day when first I knew
        So many peerless beauties blent in one,
        That, like an eagle gazing on the sun,
        Mine eyes might fix on the least part of you.
That dream hath vanished, and my hope is flown;
        For he who fain a seraph would pursue
        Wingless, hath cast words to the winds, and dew
        On stones, and gauged God's reason with his own.
If then my heart cannot endure the blaze
        Of beauties infinite that blind these eyes,
        Nor yet can bear to be from you divided,
What fate is mine? Who guides or guards my ways,
        Seeing my soul, so lost and ill-betided,
        Burns in your presence, in your absence dies?

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni

Love's Excuse.

Dal dolcie pianto.


From happy tears to woeful smiles, from peace
        Eternal to a brief and hollow truce,
        How have I fallen!--when 'tis truth we lose,
        Sense triumphs o'er all adverse impulses.
I know not if my heart bred this disease,
        That still more pleasing grows with growing use;
        Or else thy face, thine eyes, which stole the hues
        And fires of Paradise--less fair than these.
Thy beauty is no mortal thing; 'twas sent
        From heaven on high to make our earth divine:
        Wherefore, though wasting, burning, I'm content;
For in thy sight what could I do but pine?
        If God himself thus rules my destiny,
        Who, when I die, can lay the blame on thee?

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni

Love And Death.

Ognor che l' idol mio.


Whene'er the idol of these eyes appears
        Unto my musing heart so weak and strong,
        Death comes between her and my soul ere long
        Chasing her thence with troops of gathering fears.
Nathless this violence my spirit cheers
        With better hope than if she had no wrong;
        While Love invincible arrays the throng
        Of dauntless thoughts, and thus harangues his peers:
But once, he argues, can a mortal die;
        But once be born: and he who dies afire,
        What shall he gain if erst he dwelt with me?
That burning love whereby the soul flies free,
        Doth lure each fervent spirit to aspire
        Like gold refined in flame to God on high.

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni

Love's Paradoxes.

Sento d' un foco.


Far off with fire I feel a cold face lit,
        That makes me burn, the while itself doth freeze:
        Two fragile arms enchain me, which with ease,
        Unmoved themselves, can move weights infinite.
A soul none knows but I, most exquisite,
        That, deathless, deals me death, my spirit sees:
        I meet with one who, free, my heart doth seize:
        And who alone can cheer, hath tortured it.
How can it be that from one face like thine
        My own should feel effects so contrary,
        Since ill comes not from things devoid of ill?
That loveliness perchance doth make me pine,
        Even as the sun, whose fiery beams we see,
        Inflames the world, while he is temperate still.

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni

Love's Entreaty.

Tu sa' ch' i' so, Signor mie.


Thou knowest, love, I know that thou dost know
        That I am here more near to thee to be,
        And knowest that I know thou knowest me:
        What means it then that we are sundered so?
If they are true, these hopes that from thee flow,
        If it is real, this sweet expectancy,
        Break down the wall that stands 'twixt me and thee;
        For pain in prison pent hath double woe.
Because in thee I love, O my loved lord,
        What thou best lovest, be not therefore stern:
        Souls burn for souls, spirits to spirits cry!
I seek the splendour in thy fair face stored;
        Yet living man that beauty scarce can learn,
        And he who fain would find it, first must die.

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni

Love's Vain Expense.

Rendete a gli occhi miei.


Give back unto mine eyes, ye fount and rill,
        Those streams, not yours, that are so full and strong,
        That swell your springs, and roll your waves along
        With force unwonted in your native hill!

And thou, dense air, weighed with my sighs so chill,
        That hidest heaven's own light thick mists among,
        Give back those sighs to my sad heart, nor wrong
        My visual ray with thy dark face of ill!

Let earth give back the footprints that I wore,
        That the bare grass I spoiled may sprout again;
        And Echo, now grown deaf, my cries return!

Loved eyes, unto mine eyes those looks restore,
        And let me woo another not in vain,
        Since how to please thee I sh...

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni