| Samuel Waddington, comp. The Sonnets of Europe. 1888. | | | | “Art thou the man, who hast so often sung” | | By Dante Alighieri (1265–1321) |
| | Translated by Sir Theodore Martin
From the “Vita Nuova”
ART thou the man, who hast so often sung | |
| To us the worth that in our lady lies? | |
| Thy voice is his full surely, but thy guise | |
| Proclaims thee of a different lineage sprung. | |
| Why dost thou weep, with heart so sorely wrung, | 5 |
| That others look on thee with pitying eyes? | |
| Say, hast thou seen her weep, and in such wise, | |
| Thou could’st not hide the grief that to thee clung? | |
| Leave us to weep, and sadly range along. | |
| He doth a sin who seeks to comfort us; | 10 |
| For we have heard her in her anguish cry; | |
| And so deject her look, and piteous, | |
| That whosoe’er should view such sorrow’s wrong, | |
| Must feel his heart for grief within him die. | | | | |
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