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SONNETS AND MADRIGALS
OF MICHELANGELO
BUONARROTI
[Illustration: TOUT BIEN OU RIEN
The Riverside Press]
[Illustration:
SONNETS AND MADRIGALS
OF MICHELANGELO
BUONARROTI
RENDERED INTO ENGLISH
VERSE BY WILLIAM
WELLS NEWELL
WITH ITALIAN TEXT
INTRODUCTION
AND NOTES
HOUGHTON
MIFFLIN AND
COMPANY
MDCCCC
]
_Copyright 1900 by William Wells Newell
All rights reserved_
CONTENTS
_Michelangelo as Poet_ _Page_ i
_Sonnets_ ” 1
_Epigrams_ ” 26
_Madrigals_ ” 28
_Notes_ ” 59
_Index of First Lines_ ” 105
MICHELANGELO AS
POET
[Illustration: (Decorative Header)]
MICHELANGELO AS POET
Michelangelo, who considered himself as primarily sculptor,
afterwards painter, disclaimed the character of poet by profession.
He was nevertheless prolific in verse; the pieces which survive,
in number more than two hundred, probably represent only a small
part of his activity in this direction. These compositions are not
to be considered merely as the amusement of leisure, the byplay of
fancy; they represent continued meditation, frequent reworking,
careful balancing of words; he worked on a sonnet or a madrigal in
the same manner as on a statue, conceived with ardent imagination,
undertaken with creative energy, pursued under the pressure of a
superabundance of ideas, occasionally abandoned in dissatisfaction,
but at other times elaborated to that final excellence which exceeds
as well as includes all merits of the sketch, and, as he himself
said, constitutes a rebirth of the idea into the realm of eternity.
In the sculptor’s time, the custom of literary society allowed and
encouraged interchange of verses. If the repute of the writer or the
attraction of the rhymes commanded interest, these might be copied,
reach an expanding circle, and achieve celebrity. In such manner,
partly through the agency of Michelangelo himself, the sonnets of
Vittoria Colonna came into circulation, and obtained an acceptance
ending in a printed edition. But the artist did not thus arrange his
own rhymes, does not appear even to have kept copies; written on stray
leaves, included in letters, they remained as loose memoranda, or
were suffered altogether to disappear. The fame of the author secured
attention for anything to which he chose to set his hand; the verses
were copied and collected, and even gathered into the form of books;
one such manuscript gleaning he revised with his own hand. The sonnets
became known, the songs were set to music, and the recognition of
their merit induced a contemporary author, in the seventy-first year
of the poet’s life, to deliver before the Florentine Academy a lecture
on a single sonnet.
Diffusion through the printing-press, however, the poems did not
attain. Not until sixty years after the death of their author did a
grand-nephew, also called Michelangelo Buonarroti, edit the verse
of his kinsman; in this task he had regard to supposed literary
proprieties, conventionalizing the language and sentiment of lines
which seemed harsh or impolite, supplying endings for incomplete
compositions, and in general doing his best to deprive the verse of
an originality which the age was not inclined to tolerate. The recast
was accepted as authentic, and in this mutilated form the poetry
remained accessible. Fortunately the originals survived, partly in
the handwriting of the author, and in 1863 were edited by Guasti. The
publication added to the repute of the compositions, and the sonnets
especially have become endeared to many English readers.
The long neglect of Michelangelo’s poetry was owing to the
intellectual deficiencies of the succeeding generation. In spite of
the partial approbation of his contemporaries, it is likely that
these were not much more appreciative, and that their approval was
rendered rather to the fame of the maker than to the merits of the
work. The complication of the thought, frequently requiring to
be thought out word for word, demanded a mental effort beyond the
capacity of literati whose ideal was the simplicity and triviality of
Petrarchian imitators. Varchi assuredly had no genuine comprehension
of the sonnet to which he devoted three hours of his auditors’
patience; Berni, who affirmed that Michelangelo wrote things, while
other authors used words, to judge by his own compositions could
scarce have been more sensible of the artist’s emotional depth. The
sculptor, who bitterly expressed his consciousness that for the
highest elements of his genius his world had no eyes, must have felt
a similar lack of sympathy with his poetical conceptions. Here he
stood on less safe ground; unacquainted with classic literature,
unable correctly to write a Latin phrase, he must have known, to
use his own metaphor, that while he himself might value plain
homespun, the multitude admired the stuffs of silk and gold that went
to the making of a tailors’ man. It is likely that the resulting
intellectual loneliness assumed the form of modesty, and that
Michelangelo took small pains to preserve his poetry because he set
on it no great value.
The verse, essentially lyric, owed its inspiration to experience. A
complete record would have constituted a biography more intimate than
any other. But such memorial does not exist; of early productions few
survive; the extant poems, for the most part, appear to have been
composed after the sixtieth year of their author.
The series begins with a sonnet written in 1506, when Michelangelo
was thirty-one years of age. The sculptor had been called to Rome by
pope Julius, who conceived that the only way to ensure an adequately
magnificent mausoleum was to prepare it during his own lifetime.
A splendid design was made for the monument destined to prove the
embarrassment of Michelangelo’s career; but the pope was persuaded
that it was not worth while to waste his means in marbles, and in
the spring of 1506 the artist fled to Florence. In that city he may
have penned the sonnet in which Julius is blamed for giving ear to
the voice of Echo (misreporting calumniators) instead of holding the
balance even and the sword erect (in the character of a sculptured
Justice). The writer adds a bitter complaint of the injustice of
fate, which sends merit to pluck the fruit of a withered bough.
Another sonnet of the period seems to have been written in Rome;
the subscription reads: “Your Michelangelo, in Turkey.” The piece
contains an indictment against the papal court, at that time occupied
with plans for military advancement, where the eucharistic cup is
changed into helmet, and cross into lance; for safety’s sake, let
Christ keep aloof from a city where his blood would be sold dropwise.
Work there is none, and the Medusa-like pope turns the artist to
stone; if poverty is beloved by heaven, the servants of heaven, under
the opposite banner, are doing their best to destroy that other
life. In 1509, a sonnet addressed to Giovanni of Pistoia describes
the sufferings endured in executing the frescoes of the Sistine
chapel. We are shown Michelangelo bent double on his platform,
the paint oozing on his face, his eyes blurred and squinting, his
fancy occupied with conjecture of the effect produced on spectators
standing below. Allusion is made to hostile critics; the writer bids
his friend maintain the honor of one who does not profess to be a
painter. While looking upward to the vault retained in the memory
of many persons as the most holy spot in Europe, it is well to
recollect the sufferings of the artist, who in an unaccustomed field
of labor achieved a triumph such as no other decorator has obtained.
A fourth sonnet, addressed to the same Giovanni, reveals the flaming
irritability of a temper prone to exaggerate slights, especially from
a Pistoian, presumably insensible to the preëminence of Florence,
“that precious joy.”
With this group can be certainly classed only one sonnet of a
different character (No. XX). This was penned on a letter of
December, 1507, addressed to Michelangelo at Bologna, where he was
then leading a miserable life, engaged on the statue of Julius;
this work, on which he wasted three years, was finally melted into
a cannon, in order that the enemies of the pope might fire at the
latter by means of his own likeness. The verse is a spontaneous
and passionate outburst of admiration for a beautiful girl. With
this piece might be associated two or three undated compositions of
similar nature, which serve to show the error of the supposition that
the artist was insensible to feminine attractions. It may be affirmed
that the reverse was the case, and that the thoughtful temper of the
extant poetry is due solely to the sobering influences of time.
The verse which might have exhibited the transition from early to
later manhood has not been preserved; during twenty years survive
no compositions of which the date is assured. Subsequently to that
time, assistance is derived from the fortunate accident that several
of the sonnets were written on dated letters. It is true that this
indication is far from furnishing secure testimony. Even at the
present day, when paper is so easily obtained, I have known a writer
of rhyme who was in the habit of using the backs of old letters. That
Michelangelo sometimes did the same thing appears to be demonstrated
by the existence of a sonnet (No. L), which, though written on the
back of a letter of 1532, professes to be composed in extreme old
age. The evidence, therefore, is of value only when supported by the
character of the piece. Nor is internal testimony entirely to be
depended on. It is to be remembered that all makers of verse remodel
former work, complete imperfect essays, put into form reminiscences
which essentially belong to an earlier stage of feeling. Attempts to
classify the productions must follow a subjective opinion, very apt
to err. Nevertheless something may be accomplished in this direction.
The nephew states that two sonnets (Nos. XXIV and XXV) were found on
a leaf containing a memorandum of 1529. Extant is another sonnet,
certainly written on a page having an entry of that year. These
three sonnets seem to breathe the same atmosphere; the emotion is
sustained by a direct impulse, the verse is apparently inspired by
a sentiment too lyric to be unhappy; the employment of theologic
metaphor and Platonic fancy is still subsidiary to emotion. Allowing
for the imaginative indulgence of feeling common to lyrical poets,
it seems nevertheless possible to perceive a basis of personal
experience. With these pieces may be associated a number of
sonnets and madrigals, among the most beautiful productions of the
author, which may conjecturally be assigned to the period before
his permanent Roman residence, or at any rate may be supposed to
represent the impressions of such time. As compared with the work
which may with confidence be dated as produced within the ensuing
decade, these correspond to an earlier manner. Wanting the direct
and impetuous passion of the few youthful verses, they nevertheless
show a spiritual conception of sexual attachment, not yet resolved
into religious aspiration. They suggest that the inflammable and
gentle-hearted artist passed through a series of inclinations, none
of which terminated in a permanent alliance.
At the end of 1534, near his sixtieth year, Michelangelo came to
live in Rome; and to that city, three years later, Vittoria Colonna
came for a long visit, in the twelfth year of her widowhood, and the
forty-seventh of her life. An acquaintance may have been established
in the course of previous years, when the lady visited Rome, or
possibly even at a prior time. Whatever was the date of the first
encounter, allusions in the poems seem to imply that the meeting
produced a deep impression on the mind of the artist (Madrigals
LIV, LXXII). At all events, the relations of the two grew into a
friendship, hardly to be termed intimacy. Only a very few of the
poems are known to have been addressed to Vittoria; but the veiled
references of several pieces, and the tone of the poetry, appear
to justify the opinion that admiration for this friend was the
important influence that affected the character of the verse written
during the ten years before her death in 1547.
In Rome, the Marchioness of Pescara made her home in the convent of
San Silvestro, where she reigned as queen of an intelligent circle. A
charming and welcome glimpse of this society is furnished by Francis
of Holland, who professes to relate three conversations, held on as
many Sunday mornings, in which the sculptor took a chief part. It
is not difficult to imagine the calmness and coolness of the place,
the serious and placid beauty of the celebrated lady, the figure of
Michelangelo, the innocent devices by which the sympathetic Vittoria
contrived to educe his vehement outbursts on artistic questions, the
devout listening of the stranger, hanging on the chief artist of
Italy with the attention of a reporter who means to put all into a
book. So far as the conversation represents a symposium on matters
of art, no doubt the account is to be taken as in good measure the
method adopted by Francis to put before the world his own ideas;
but among the remarks are many so consonant to the character of the
sculptor that it is impossible to doubt the essential correctness
of the narration. In the language of Michelangelo speaks haughty
reserve, the consciousness of superiority, accompanied by a sense
that his most precious qualities exceeded the comprehension of
a world which rendered credit less to the real man than to the
fashionable artist, and whose attention expressed not so much
gratitude for illumination as desire of becoming associated with what
society held in respect.
All students who have had occasion to concern themselves with
the biography of Vittoria Colonna have become impressed with the
excellence of her character. After the loss of a husband to whom
she had been united in extreme youth, she declared her intention of
forming no new ties; and it must have been an exceptional purity
which the censorious and corrupt world could associate with no
breath of scandal. She had been accounted the most beautiful woman
in Italy, of that golden-haired and broadbrowed type recognized as
favorite; but her intelligence, rather than personal attractions
or social position, had made her seclusion in Ischia a place of
pilgrimage for men of letters. The attraction she possessed for
the lonely, reserved, and proud artist is a testimony that to her
belonged especially the inexplicable attraction of a sympathetic
nature. Such disposition is a sufficient explanation of her devotion
to the memory of a husband who appears to have been essentially a
_condottiere_ of the time, a soldier who made personal interest his
chief consideration. She may also be credited with a sound judgment
and pure ethical purpose in the practical affairs of life.
Yet to allow that Vittoria Colonna was good and lovable does not make
it necessary to worship her as a tenth muse, according to the partial
judgment of her contemporaries. Unfortunately, time has spared her
verses, respecting which may be repeated advice bestowed by Mrs.
Browning in regard to another female author, by no means to indulge
in the perusal, inasmuch as they seem to disprove the presence of
a talent which she nevertheless probably possessed. In the case
commented on by the modern writer, the genius absent in the books
is revealed in the correspondence; but epistolary composition was
not the forte of the Marchioness of Pescara, whose communications,
regarded as pabulum for a hungry heart, are as jejune as can be
conceived. Neither is she to be credited with originality in her
attitude toward political or religious problems. It does not appear
that she quarreled with the principles of the polite banditti of her
own family; nor was she able to attain even an elementary notion of
Italian patriotism. She has been set down as a reformer in religion;
but such tendency went no further than a sincere affection toward the
person of the founder of Christianity, a piety in no way inconsistent
with ritual devotion. When it came to the dividing of the ways, she
had no thought other than to follow the beaten track. Nor in the
world of ideas did she possess greater independence; with all her
esteem for Michelangelo as artist and man, it is not likely that she
was able to estimate the sources of his supremacy, any more than to
foresee a time when her name would have interest for the world only
as associated with that of the sculptor. It may be believed that a
mind capable of taking pleasure in the commonplaces of her rhyme
could never have appreciated the essential merits of the mystic
verse which she inspired. Here, also, Michelangelo was destined to
remain uncomprehended. Vittoria presented him with her own poems,
neatly written out and bound, but never seems to have taken the
pains to gather those of the artist. Intellectually, therefore,
her limitations were many; but she was endowed with qualities more
attractive, a gentle sympathy, a noble kindness, a person and
expression representative of that ideal excellence which the sculptor
could appreciate only as embodied in human form.
While earlier writers of biography were inclined to exaggerate
the effect on Michelangelo of his acquaintance with Vittoria
Colonna, later authors, as I think, have fallen into the opposite
error. To Vittoria, indeed, whose thoughts, when not taken up
with devotional exercises, were occupied with the affairs of her
family or of the church, such amity could occupy only a subordinate
place. One of her letters to Michelangelo may be taken as a
polite repression of excessive interest. But on the other side,
the poetry of the artist is a clear, almost a painful expression
of his own state of mind. We are shown, in the mirror of his own
verse, a sensitive, self-contained, solitary nature, aware that
he is out of place in a world for which he lacks essential graces
and in which he is respected for his least worthy qualities. That
under such circumstances he should value the kindness of the only
woman with whom he could intelligently converse, that he should
feel the attraction of eyes from which seemed to descend starry
influences, that he should suffer from the sense of inadequacy and
transitoriness, from the difference of fortune and the lapse of
years, the contrasts of imagination and possibility, was only, as he
would have said, to manifest attribute in act, to suffer the natural
pain incident to sensitive character.
In the most striking of the compositions devoted to the memory of
Vittoria Colonna Michelangelo speaks of her influence as the tool
by which his own genius had been formed, and which, when removed to
heaven and made identical with the divine archetype, left no earthly
substitute. That the language was no more than an expression of the
fact is shown by the alteration which from this time appears in his
verse. Poetry passes over into piety; artistic color is exchanged
for the monotone of religious emotion. One may be glad that the
old age, of whose trials he has left a terrible picture, found its
support and alleviation; yet the later poems, distressing in their
solemnity, pietistic in their self-depreciation, exhibit a declining
poetic faculty, and in this respect are not to be ranked with their
forerunners.
The verse of Michelangelo has been lauded as philosophic. The
epithet is out of place; if by philosophy be meant metaphysics,
there is no such thing as philosophic poetry. Poetry owes no debt
to metaphysical speculation, can coexist as well with one type of
doctrine as with another. The obligation is on the other side;
philosophy is petrified poetry, which no infusion of adventitious
sap can relegate to vital function. Like all other developments of
life, philosophic theories can be employed by poets only for colors
of the palette. If Platonic conceptions be deemed exceptional, it is
because such opinions are themselves poetry more than metaphysics,
and constitute rather metaphorical expressions for certain human
sentiments than any system of ratiocination. For the purposes
of Michelangelo, these doctrines supplied an adequate means of
presentation, quite independent of the abstract verity of the
principles considered as the product of reasoning.
With the sculptor, it was the impressions and feelings of later
life that this philosophy served to convey. The few remains of
comparative youth lead us to suppose that in the verse of this time
the reflective quality was subordinate; the productions of later
manhood breathe a gentle emotion, which, allowing for contrasts, may
be compared with that animating the poetry of Wordsworth; only in
compositions belonging to incipient age do we find a full development
of Platonic conceptions; these, again, constitute a step in the
progress toward that Christian quietism into which the stream of
the poet’s genius emerges, as from its impetuous source, through
the powerful flow of its broadening current, a great river at last
empties itself into the all-encompassing sea.
This philosophy was no result of reading, but a deposit from
conversations which the youth had overheard in the Medicean gardens,
where he may have listened to the eloquence of Marsilio Ficino. When
the time came, these reminiscences were able to influence imagination
and color fancy. For a commentary on Michelangelo, one has no need
to go to the Phaedrus or Symposium; the verse, like all true poetry,
is self-illuminative. That God is the archetype and fountain-head of
all excellency, that external objects suggest the perfection they
do not include, that objects of nature, reflected in the mirror
of the intelligence, move the soul to perform the creative act by
which outward beauty is reborn into her own likeness, and loved as
the representation of her own divinity, that the highest property
of external things is to cause human thought to transcend from the
partial to the universal,--these are conceptions so simple and
natural that no course of study is necessary to their appreciation.
The ideas are received as symbols of certain moral conditions, and so
far not open to debate. Only when the attempt is made to generalize,
to set them up as the sum of all experience, do they become doubtful;
the principles are better comprehended without the dialectic, and
indeed it frequently happens that he who has paid most attention to
the latter is least informed respecting the true significance of the
imaginations for the sake of which the argument professes to exist.
Hand in hand with this Hellenic, one might say human mysticism, went
the Christian mysticism expressed in the poetry of Dante. In place
of the serene archetype, the apotheosis of reason, we are presented
with the archetypal love, reaching out toward mankind through the
forms of nature. No longer the calm friend, the beloved person
is conceived as the ardent angel, messenger from the empyrean,
descending and revealing. It has been held that these two forms of
thought are irreconcilable; I should consider them as complementary.
Before the beginnings of the Christian church had been effected a
union of Platonic imagination with Hebrew piety; Christian sentiment
expresses in terms of affection the philosophic doctrine, also pious
and poetic, however proclaimed under the name and with the coloring
of sober reason.
It could not have been expected that in the poetical activity which
of necessity with him remained a subordinate interest, Michelangelo
should have manifested the full measure of that independent force,
which in two arts had proved adequate to break new channels. This
third method of expression served to manifest a part of his nature
for which grander tasks did not supply adequate outlets; the verse
accordingly reveals new aspects of character. It was for gentle,
wistful, meditative emotions that the artist found it necessary
to use rhyme. If not torrential, the current was vital; no line
unfreshened by living waters. This function explains the limitation
of scope; essays in pastoral, in _terza rima_, served to prove that
here did not lie his path; in the conventional forms of the sonnet
and the madrigal he found the medium desired. The familiarity of
the form did not prevent originality of substance; he had from youth
been intimate with the youthful melodies of Dante, the lucid sonnets
of Petrarch; but his own style, controlled by thought, is remote
from the gentle music of the one, the clear flow of the other. The
verse exhibits a superabundance of ideas, not easily brought within
the limits of the rhyme; amid an imagery prevailingly tender and
reflective, now and then a gleam or a flash reveals the painter of
the Sistine and the sculptor of the Medicean chapel.
Essentially individual is the artistic imagery. As Michelangelo was
above all a creator whose genius inclined him toward presentation
of the unadorned human form, so his metaphors are prevailingly
taken from the art of sculpture, a loan which enriches the verse by
the association with immortal works. These comparisons, taken from
the methods of the time, are not altogether such as could now be
employed. At the outset, indeed, the procedure scarcely differed;
with the sculptor of the Renaissance, the first step was to produce
a sketch of small dimensions; the same thing is done by the modern
artist, who commonly uses clay and plaster in place of wax. It
is in the nature of the design, or, as Michelangelo said, of the
“model,” that, as having the character of an impression, it must
superabound in rude vitality, as much as it is deficient in symmetry
and “measure.” The next step, then as now, might be the preparation
of a form answering in size to that of the intended figure, but
also in wax or clay. In the final part of the process, however,
the distinction is complete; in the sixteenth century no way was
open to the maker, but himself to perfect the statue with hammer
and chisel. The advance of mechanical skill has enabled the modern
artist to dispense with this labor. It may be questioned whether
the consequent saving of pains is in all respects an advantage;
at least, I have the authority of one of the most accomplished of
modern portrait sculptors for the opinion that in strict propriety
every kind of plastic work ought to receive its final touches from
the hand of the designer. Even if this were done, the method would
not answer to that of the earlier century, when it was the practice
to cleave away the marble in successive planes, in such manner
as gradually to disengage the outlines of the image, which thus
appeared to lie veiled beneath the superficies, as an indwelling
tenant waiting release from the hand of the carver. Moreover, the
preciousness of the material had on the fancy a salutary influence;
before beginning his task, the sculptor was compelled to take into
account the possibility of execution. He would commonly feel himself
obliged to make use of any particular block of marble which he might
have the fortune to possess; it might even happen that such block
possessed an unusual form, as was the case with the stone placed at
the disposal of Michelangelo, and from which he created his David.
The test of genius would therefore be the ability, on perception of
the material, to form a suitable conception; a sculptor, if worthy
of the name, would perceive the possible statue within the mass.
The metaphor, so frequently and beautifully used by Michelangelo,
which represents the artist as conceiving the dormant image which
his toil must bring forth from its enveloping stone, is therefore no
commonplace of scholastic philosophy, no empty phrase declaring that
matter potentially contains unnumbered forms, but a true description
of the process of creative energy. Inasmuch as by an inevitable
animism all conceptions derived from human activity are imaginatively
transferred to external life, the comparison is extended into the
realm of Nature, which by a highly poetic forecast of the modern
doctrine of evolution is said through the ages to aim at attaining an
ideal excellence. The impulse visible in the art of the sculptor thus
appears in his poetry, which, also perfected through unwearied toil,
terminates in a result which is truly organic, and of which all parts
seem to derive from a central idea.
A lyric poet, if he possess genuine talent, is concerned with the
presentation, not of form or thought, but of emotion. His fancy,
therefore, commonly operates in a manner different from that of the
artist, whose duty it is primarily to consider the visual image; the
verse of the latter, if he undertakes to express himself also in the
poetic manner, is usually characterized by a predominance of detail,
an overdistinctness of parts, an inability of condensation, qualities
belonging to an imagination conceiving of life as definitely formal
rather than as vaguely impressive. On the contrary, Michelangelo
is a true lyrist, whose mental vision is not too concrete to be
also dreamy. This property is a strange proof of the multiformity
of his genius, for it is the reverse of what one would expect
from a contemplation of his plastic work. The inspiration, though
in a measure biographic, is no mere reflection of the experience;
notwithstanding the sincerity of the impulse, as should be the case
in lyric verse, the expression transcends to the universal.
It does not detract from his worth as a lyrical writer, that the
range of the themes is narrow, a limitation sufficiently explained by
the conditions. The particular sentiment for the expression of which
he needed rhyme was sexual affection. In the verse, if not in the
art, “all thoughts, all passions, all delights” are ministers of that
emotion. Michelangelo is as much a poet of love as Heine or Shelley.
The sonnets were intended not to be sung, but to be read; this
purpose may account for occasional deficiencies of music. The beauty
of the idea, the abundance of the thought, the sincerity of the
emotion, cause them to stand in clear contrast to the productions of
contemporary versifiers.
Less attention has been paid to the madrigals, on which the author
bestowed equal pains. These are songs, and the melody has affected
the thought. The self-consciousness of the poet is subordinated to
the objectivity of the musician who aims to render human experience
into sweet sound. For the most part, and with some conspicuous
exceptions, even where the idea is equally mystical, the reasoning is
not so intricate nor the sentiment so biographic. A certain number
have the character of simple love verse. In these compositions ardor
is unchecked by reflection, and desire allowed its natural course,
unquenched by the abundant flow of the thought which it has awakened.
What assumes the aspect of love-sorrow is in reality a joyous current
of life mocking grief with the music of its ripples. If one desired
to name the composer whom the sentiment suggests, he might mention
Schumann rather than Beethoven.
Other indifferent artists have been excellent poets, and other
tolerable versifiers clever artists; but only once in human history
has coexisted the highest talent for plastic form and verbal
expression. Had these verses come down without name, had they been
disinterred from the dust of a library as the legacy of an anonymous
singer, they would be held to confer on the maker a title to rank
among intellectual benefactors. It would be said that an unknown
poet, whose verse proved him also a sculptor, had contributed to
literature thoughts whose character might be summed up in the lines
of his madrigal:--
_Dalle più alte stelle
Discende uno splendore
Che ’l desir tira a quelle;
E qui si chiama amore._
SONNETS EPIGRAMS AND MADRIGALS
A SELECTION FROM THE SONNETS OF MICHELANGELO BUONARROTI
I
_Dal ciel discese, e col mortal suo, poi
Che visto ebbe l’inferno giusto e ’l pio,
Ritornò vivo a contemplare Dio,
Per dar di tutto il vero lume a noi:
Lucente stella, che co’ raggi suoi
Fe chiaro, a torto, el nido ove naqqu’io;
Nè sare’ ’l premio tutto ’l mondo rio:
Tu sol, che la creasti, esser quel puoi.
Di Dante dico, che mal conosciute
Fur l’opre suo da quel popolo ingrato,
Che solo a’ iusti manca di salute.
Fuss’io pur lui! c’a tal fortuna nato,
Per l’aspro esilio suo, con la virtute,
Dare’ del mondo il più felice stato._
_From heaven he came, and clothed in mortal clay,
Traversed the vengeful and the chastening woes,
Living, again toward height eternal rose,
For us to win the light of saving day;
Resplendent star, whose undeservèd ray
Made glory in the nest where I had birth;
Whose recompense not all a stainèd earth,
But Thou his Maker, Thou alone couldst pay.
Dante I mean, and that unfair return
Endured from a community ingrate,
That only to the just awardeth scorn;
Would I were he! To equal fortune born,
For his pure virtue, for his exile stern,
I would resign earth’s happiest estate._
II
_Da che concetto ha l’arte intera e diva
La forma e gli atti d’alcun, poi di quello
D’umil materia un semplice modello
È ’l primo parto che da quel deriva.
Ma nel secondo poi di pietra viva
S’adempion le promesse del martello;
E sì rinasce tal concetto e bello,
Che ma’ non è chi suo eterno prescriva.
Simil, di me model, nacqu’io da prima;
Di me model, per cosa più perfetta
Da voi rinascer poi, donna alta e degna.
Se ’l poco accresce, e ’l mio superchio lima
Vostra pietà; qual penitenzia aspetta
Mio fiero ardor, se mi gastiga e insegna?_
_Some deed or form of our humanity
When genius hath conceived of art divine,
Her primal birth, an incomplete design,
Is shaped in stuff of humble quality.
More late, in living marble’s purity
The chisel keepeth promise to the full;
Reborn is the idea so beautiful,
That it belongeth to eternity.
So me did Nature make the model rude,
The model of myself, a better thing
By nobleness of thine to be renewed;
If thy compassion, its work cherishing,
Enlarge, and pare; mine ardor unsubdued
Awaiteth at thy hand what chastening!_
III
_Non ha l’ottimo artista alcun concetto,
Ch’un marmo solo in sè non circonscriva
Col suo soverchio; e solo a quello arriva
La man che ubbidisce all’intelletto.
Il mal ch’io fuggo, e ’l ben ch’io mi prometto,
In te, donna leggiadra, altera e diva,
Tal si nasconde; e perch’io più non viva,
Contraria ho l’arte al disiato effetto.
Amor dunque non ha, nè tua beltate,
O durezza, o fortuna, o gran disdegno,
Del mio mal colpa, o mio destino o sorte;
Se dentro del tuo cor morte e pietate
Porti in un tempo, e che ’l mio basso ingegno
Non sappia, ardendo, trarne altro che morte._
_The chief of artists can imagine nought,
Other than form that hideth in a stone,
Below its surface veilèd; here alone
Arriveth hand, obedient to his thought.
So, fair and noble lady, e’en in thee,
The good I seek, the evil that I fly,
Remain enveloped; whence reluctant, I
Create my aspiration’s contrary.
It is not love, ’tis not thy beauty fair,
Ungentle pride, thy fortune ruling so,
Nor destiny of mine, that hath to bear
The censure, if my genius faint and low,
While Death and Pity both thou dost conceal,
Though passionèd, can only Death reveal._
IV
_Com’ esser, donna, può quel ch’alcun vede
Per lunga sperienza, che più dura
L’ immagin viva in pietra alpestra e dura,
Che ’l suo fattor, che gli anni in cener riede?
La causa all’effetto inclina e cede,
Onde dall’arte è vinta la natura.
Io ’l so, che ’l provo in la bella scultura;
Ch’ all’opra il tempo e morte non tien fede.
Dunque posso ambo noi dar lunga vita
In qual sie modo, o di colore o sasso,
Di noi sembrando l’uno e l’altro volto:
Sì che mill’anni dopo la partita
Quanto e voi bella fusti, e quant’io lasso
Si veggia, e com’amarvi io non fui stolto._
_How, lady, can the mind of man allow,
What lapse of many ages hath made known,
That image shapen of pure mountain stone
Outlive the life that did with life endow?
Before effect the very cause doth bow,
And Art is crowned in Nature’s deep despair.
I know, and prove it, carving form so fair,
That Time and Death admire, and break their vow.
Power, therefore, I possess, to grant us twain
Estate, in color, or in marble cold,
That spent a thousand summers, shall remain
The face of either, and all eyes behold
How thou wert beautiful, and gaze on me,
Weary, yet justified in loving thee._
V
_Io mi son caro assai più ch’io non soglio;
Poi ch’io t’ebbi nel cor, più di me vaglio:
Come pietra ch’aggiuntovi l’intaglio,
È di più pregio che ’l suo primo scoglio.
O come scritta o pinta carta o foglio,
Più si riguarda d’ogni straccio o taglio;
Tal di me fo, da poi ch’io fui bersaglio
Segnato dal tuo viso: e non mi doglio.
Sicur con tale stampa in ogni loco
Vo, come quel c’ha incanti o arme seco,
Ch’ ogni periglio gli fan venir meno.
I’ vaglio contro all’acqua e contro al foco,
Col segno tuo rallumino ogni cieco,
E col mio sputo sano ogni veleno._
_I feel myself more precious than of yore,
Now that my life thy signature doth show,
As gem inscribed with its intaglio
Excelleth pebble it appeared before,
Or writ or painted page is valued more
Than idle leaf discarded carelessly;
So I, the target of thine archery,
Grow proud of marks I need not to deplore.
Signed with thy seal, in confidence I dwell,
As one who journeyeth in woundless mail,
Or hath his way protected by a spell;
O’er fire and flood I equally prevail,
Do works of healing by the signet’s might,
Poison allay, and yield the blind their sight._
VI
_Quanto si gode, lieta e ben contesta
Di fior, sopra’ crin d’or d’una, grillanda;
Che l’altro inanzi l’uno all’altro manda,
Come ch’il prima sia a baciar la testa!
Contenta è tutto il giorno quella vesta
Che serra ’l petto, e poi par che si spanda;
E quel c’oro filato si domanda
Le guanci’ e ’l collo di toccar non resta.
Ma più lieto quel nastro par che goda,
Dorato in punta, con si fatte tempre,
Che preme e tocca il petto ch’egli allaccia.
E la schietta cintura che s’annoda
Mi par dir seco: qui vo’ stringier sempre!
Or che farebbon dunche le mie braccia?_
_The blossom-twinèd garland of her hair
Delighteth so to crown her sunny tress,
That flowers one before the other press
To be the first to kiss that forehead fair;
Her gown all day puts on a blithesome air,
Clingeth, then floweth free for happiness;
Her meshèd net rejoiceth to caress
The cheek whereby it lies, and nestle there;
More fortunate, her golden-pointed lace
Taketh her breathing in as close a hold
As if it cherished what it may enfold;
And simple zone that doth her waist embrace
Seemeth to plead: “Here give me leave to stay!”
What would my arms do, if they had their way?_
VII
_Se nel volto per gli occhi il cor si vede,
Altro segnio non ho più manifesto
Delia mie fiamma: addunche basti or questo,
Signior mie caro, a domandar mercede.
Forse lo spirto tuo, con maggior fede
Ch’io non credo, che sguarda il foco onesto
Che m’arde, fie di me pietoso e presto;
Come grazia ch’abbonda a chi ben chiede.
O felice quel dì, se questo e certo!
Fermisi in un momenta il tempo e l’ore,
Il giorno e il sol nella su’ antica traccia;
Acciò ch’i’ abbi, e non già per mie merto,
Il desiato mie dolce signore
Per sempre nell’indegnie e pronte braccia._
_If eyes avail heart-passion to declare,
My love requires no more explicit sign,
For eloquent enow are looks of mine,
O dear my mistress, to convey my prayer.
Perchance, more credulous than I believe,
Thou seest how purely doth my passion burn,
And now art ready toward desire to turn,
As he who asketh mercy must receive.
If so befall, on that thrice happy day
Let course of time be suddenly complete,
The sun give over his primeval race;
That through no merit of my own, I may
Henceforth forever, my desirèd sweet
In these unworthy, eager arms embrace!_
VIII
_Spirto ben nato, in cui si specchia e vede
Nelle tue belle membra oneste e care
Quante natura e ’l ciel tra no’ può fare,
Quand’ a null’altra suo bell’opra cede:
Spirto leggiadro, in cui si spera e crede
Dentro, come di fuor nel viso appare,
Amor, pietà, mercè; cose sì rare,
Che ma’ furn’ in beltà con tanta fede:
L’amor mi prende, e la beltà mi lega;
La pietà, la mercè con dolci sguardi
Ferma speranz’ al cor par che ne doni.
Qual uso o qual governo al mondo niega,
Qual crudeltà per tempo, o qual più tardi,
C’ a sì bel viso morte non perdoni?_
_O spirit nobly born, wherein we see
Through all thy members innocent and dear,
As if reflected in a mirror clear,
What Heaven and Nature can make life to be;
O spirit gentle, where by faith we know
Indwell what doth thy countenance declare,
Love, Mercy, and Compassion, things so rare,
That never beauty hath combined them so;
The love to charm, the beauty to retain,
The tenderness, the pity, to uphold
By glances mild the soul that doubteth grace;
What mortal law, what custom doth ordain,
What doom unmerciful to young or old,
That Death may not forgive so fair a face?_
IX
_Dimmi di grazia, amor, se gli occhi mei
Veggono ’l ver della beltà ch’aspiro,
O s’io l’ho dentro allor che, dov’io miro,
Veggio più bello el viso di costei.
Tu ’l de’ saper, po’ che tu vien con lei
A torm’ ogni mie pace, ond’io m’adiro;
Nè vorre’ manco un minima sospiro,
Nè men ardente foco chiederei.
La beltà che tu vedi è ben da quella;
Ma crescie poi ch’ a miglior loco sale,
Se per gli occhi mortali all’alma corre.
Quivi si fa divina, onesta e bella,
Com’ a sè simil vuol cosa immortale:
Questa, e non quella, a gli occhi tuo’ precorre._
“_Love, be my teacher, of thy courtesy;
The beauty, whither my regards aspire,
Doth it exist? Or is what I admire
Made beautiful by force of fantasy?
Thou, Love, must know, who in her company
Arrivest oft to vex me with desire,
Although I would not choose to quench the fire,
Abate its glow, nor part with any sigh._”
“_The beauty thou hast seen from her did shine,
And meet thy mortal vision; but its ray
Ascended to the soul, a better place;
There seemed she lovely, for a thing divine
Hath joy of its own image; in this way
Came beauty thou beholdest in her face._”
X
_Non posso altra figura immaginarmi,
O di nud’ombra o di terrestre spoglia,
Col più alto pensier, tal che mie voglia
Contra la tuo beltà di quella s’armi.
Che, da te mosso, tanto sciender parmi,
Ch’amor d’ogni valor mi priva e spoglia;
Ond’ a pensar di minuir mie doglia,
Duplicando, la morte viene a darmi.
Però non val che più sproni mie fuga,
Doppiando ’l corso alla beltà nemica;
Che il men dal più velocie non si scosta.
Amor con le sue man gli occhi m’asciuga,
Promettendomi cara ogni fatica;
Chè vile esser non può chi tanto costa._
_My strong imagination cannot make
From solid earth or air of reverie,
The form of beauty, that my will can take
To be its shield and armor against thee.
Abandoned, I decline, till everything
Doth vanish, that I am and I possess;
The thought that haply I may suffer less,
Destroyeth me beyond all suffering.
No hope of safety, when to turn and flee
Will only speed an enemy’s career;
The slower from the fleeter cannot stray;
Yet Love consoleth and caresseth me,
Declaring that my toil may yet be dear;
A thing so costly is not thrown away._
XI
_La vita del mie amor non è ’l cor mio,
Ch’amor, di quel ch’io t’amo, è senza core;
Dov’è cosa mortal piena d’errore,
Esser non può già ma’, nè pensier rio.
Amor nel dipartir l’alma da Dio
Me fe’ san occhio, e te luc’ e splendore;
Nè può non rivederlo in quel che muore
Di te, per nostro mal, mie gran disio.
Come dal foco el caldo esser diviso
Non può, dal bell’etterno ogni mie stima,
Ch’esalta, ond’ella vien, chi più ’l somiglia.
Tu c’hai negli occhi tutto ’l paradiso,
Per ritornar là dov’i’ t’ama’ prima,
Ricorro ardendo sott’alle tuo ciglia._
_My love doth use no dwelling in the heart,
But maketh mansion only in the soul;
Fie entereth not where sinful hopes control,
Where error and mortality have part.
From source in God commanded to depart,
Myself He made the eye, the lustre, thee;
I cannot choose but His eternal see,
In what, alas! is thy decaying part.
No more may fire be sundered from its heat,
Than my desire from that celestial Fair
Whence thine derives, wherewith it doth compare;
My soul, enkindled, maketh her retreat
To primal home, where love did first arise,
The Paradise secluded in thine eyes._
XII
_I’ mi credetti, il primo giorno ch’ io
Mira’ tante bellezze uniche e sole,
Fermar gli occhi, com’ aquila nel sole,
Nella minor di tante ch’ i’ desio.
Po’ conosciut’ ho il fallo e l’ erro mio;
Chè chi senz’ ale un angel seguir vole,
Il seme a’ sassi, al vento le parole
Indarno ispargie, e l’ intelletto a Dio.
Dunche, s’ appresso il cor non mi sopporta
L’ infinita beltà, che gli occhi abbaglia,
Nè di lontan par m’ assicuri o fidi;
Che fie di me? qual guida o quale scorta
Fie che con teco ma’ mi giovi o vaglia,
S’ appresso m’ ardi, e nel partir m’ uccidi?_
_I deemed when erst upon my prospect shone
The mateless splendor of thy beauty’s day,
That as an eagle seeks the sun alone,
I might have rested only on a ray.
With lapse of time, mine error have I known,
For who would soar in angels’ company,
On stony ground his idle seed hath sown,
Lost words in air, and thought in deity.
If near at hand, I may not well abide
Thy brilliancy that overcometh sight,
And far, appear to leave consoling light,
Ah, what shall I become? what friend, what guide,
Will render aid, or plead my cause with thee,
If either thou consum’st or grievest me?_
XIII
_Veggio co’ bei vostri occhi un dolce lume,
Che co’ miei ciechi già veder non posso;
Porto co’ vostri piedi un pondo a dosso,
Che de’ mie’ zoppi non è già costume;
Volo con le vostr’ ale senza piume;
Col vostr’ingegno al ciel sempre son mosso;
Dal vostr’ arbitrio son pallido e rosso;
Freddo al sol, caldo alle più fredde brume.
Nel voler vostro è sol la voglia mia,
I mie’ pensier nel vostro cor si fanno,
Nel vostro fiato son le mia parole.
Come luna da sè sol par ch’ io sia;
Chè gli occhi nostri in del veder non sanno
Se non quel tanto che n’ accende il sole._
_With thy clear eyes I view a radiance fair,
Before to my blind vision quite unknown;
I carry with thy feet a weight, mine own,
Of halting steps, were never free to bear;
Upon thy wings I soar to heaven, and there
By thy swift genius are its glories shown;
I pale and redden at thy choice alone,
Grow chill in sunlight, warm in frosty air.
Thy will is evermore my sole desire,
Within thy heart conceived each wish of mine,
My accents framèd purely of thy breath;
Like to the moon am I, that hath no fire,
But only is beheld in heaven to shine
According as the sun illumineth._
XIV
_S’ un casto amor, s ’una pietà superna,
S’ una fortuna infra dua amanti equale,
S’ un’ aspra sorte all ’un dell’ altro cale,
S’ un spirto, s’ un voler duo cor governa;
S’ un’ anima in duo corpi è fatta eterna,
Ambo levando al cielo e con pari ale;
S’ amor d’ un colpo e d’ un dorato strale
Le viscier di duo petti arda e discierna;
S’ amar l’ un l’ altro, e nessun se medesmo,
D’ un gusto e d’ un diletto, a tal mercede,
C’ a un fin voglia l’ uno e l’ altro porre;
Se mille e mille non sarien centesmo
A tal nodo d’ amore, a tanta fede;
E sol l’ isdegnio il può rompere e sciorre?_
_If one chaste love, one sacred piety,
One fortune sharèd ’twixt two lovers so,
That either’s care from heart to heart may flow,
Impelled by one desire, one energy;
If bodies both are by one soul controlled,
That wingèd bears them up to heaven’s gate;
If love, with one essay, doth penetrate
And burn two bosoms with one shaft of gold;
If living each in other, self forgot,
One liking, one felicity, awake
One will to move toward one desirèd lot;
If thousand ties as holy, fail to make
A thousandth part; the consecrated knot,
Shall pride, and pride alone, avail to break?_
XV
_Perchè tuo gran bellezze al mondo sieno
In donna più cortese e manco dura,
Prego se ne ripigli la natura
Tutte quelle ch’ ogn’ or ti vengon meno;
E serbi a riformar del tuo sereno
E divin volto una gientil figura
Del ciel, e sia d’ amor perpetua cura
Rifarne un cor di grazia e pietà pieno.
E serbi poi i miei sospiri ancora,
E le lacrime sparte insieme accoglia,
E doni a chi quella ami un’ altra volta.
Forse a pietà chi nascierà ’n quell ’ora
La moverà con la mie propria doglia;
Nè fia persa la grazia ch’ or m’ è tolta._