Sonnet 3
Qual in colle aspro, al imbrunir di sera
L'avezza giovinetta pastorella
Va bagnando l'herbetta strana e bella
Che mal si spande a disusata spera
Fuor di sua natia alma primavera,
Cosi Amor meco insù la lingua snella
Desta il fior novo de strania favella,
Mentre io di te, vezzosamente altera,
Canto, dal mio buon popol non inteso
E'l bel Tamigi cangio col bel Arno.
Amor lo volse, ed io a l'altrui peso
Seppi ch'Amor cosa mai volse indarno.
Deh! foss'il mio cuor lento e'l duro seno
A chi pianta dal ciel si buon terreno.
Sonnet 3
At dusk, on the jagged hillside, the skilled, young shepherdess waters a beautiful, exotic plant that cannot thrive in this hopeless place, far from its native springtime. So also love nourishes on my nimble tongue a new blossom of foreign speech. Singing of you, gracious and proud, not understood by my own countrymen, I trade fair Thames for the fair Arno. Love so willed it, and I, from the distress of others, know that love never willed in vain. Ah, if only my dull heart and stony breast were as fine a soil as for heavenly seed.
Translation by Meredith Russo and Thomas H. Luxon
