THE EIGHTEENTH SONNET OF PETRARCA.
Reading edition
———
BY FAYETTE ROBINSON.
———
Had I but waited patient in the cell
Where great Apollo erst became divine,
One bard might call himself a Florentine,
Like those who once in other lands did dwell.
But here the holy ichor doth not swell,
And fate hath willed another lot be mine.
’Tis meet that I relinquish high design
And drink the waters of life’s turbid well.
Sear are the olive branches now, the stream
Near which they grew and looked toward the sky
Hath sunken deep beneath the rock again.
Fate or my fault hath aye dispelled the dream
That made me fix my early hopes so high,
Unless God will their height I should attain.