Throughout Il Canzoniere, Petrarca professes his love for Laura in several ways. When he talks about the weight of her death in this sonnet, for example, it gives us, as the readers, an understanding of the admiration that he has for her. Love is seemingly the main theme of a handful of his poems, including this one, however he does not always portray it as a constant beautiful feeling. For instance, this sonnet explores the complexities of love and how it can be constricting.
In the first stanza, Petrarca writes “My days, swifter than any fawn, have fled like shadows” which explicitly reveals that he has lost all sense of time. This is awfully common for people who aren’t experiencing any excitement in their life, or have no hope for their future. He also compares the duration of all the good things in his life to a wink, which effectively shows how fast these moments come and go. Lastly, when he talks about his calmest hours, which he says are few and far between, he uses the word “bittersweet” to describe them, because his mind is truly never at ease. Even when things seem to be going better for him, he constantly thinks about how much happier he would be if he and Laura were together.
In the next stanza, Petrarca lets out all his anger and frustration with the world. He describes it as “wretched” and “arrogant” because of the broken condition that he was left in after Laura’s death. He also condemns any man that puts their trust into the world, even calling them “blind,” because at one point he was that same man that put his hope out there in the world. He believes that he was given false hope, as he is now unhappy because the person who owns his heart is merely dust, not a person in the flesh. Even though he is fully aware that Laura is not with us, he continues to express his love for her in the third stanza, where he says that her soul (“her best form”) continues living in the Heavens and keeps him more in love.
In the final stanza, Petrarca reintroduces the idea of time passing him by. He mentions that as he gets older and his hair grays, the only thing that he can think of is Laura and what she is like. This, once again, only reinforces the sentiment that he is chained to this love for eternity.
Very nice!
To be more precise you could call this poem a sonnet. I would say love is the main “topic” (instead of genre).
I have a question for you: Do you think he would be really happy if he were with Laura?
I really liked your poem, Gary, I enjoyed the way you explained how he was expressing his feelings through words that could’ve gone unnoticed. I honestly think that the sonnet you were analyzing connects slightly with mine because mine discussed how Laura’s rejection hurt Petrarca and how after that he was in anguish but he still loved her even though he blamed it. It connects because I’m your analysis you were mentioning that although he is in pain and suffering from her death he still speaks on his love for her and its effects on him. The way he mentions his emotions are quite vague but only noticed through the use of tone and word usage which you highlighted. I also liked how instead of calling your analysis love you called it shackled because it’s as though his feeling for Laura has him shackled to his pain and inevitably her even after death.
Very well done: comparisons are an excellent way to continue the conversation about any work of art.