Love and He Seek Laura, but Find No Traces of Her Except in the Sky
That sun, which ever signall'd the right road,Where flash'd her own bright feet, to heaven to fly,Returning to the Eternal Sun on high,Has quench'd my light, and cast her earthly load;Thus, lone and weary, my oft steps have trode,As some wild animal, the sere woods by,Fleeing with heavy heart and downcast eyeThe world which since to me a blank has show'd.Still with fond search each well-known spot I paceWhere once I saw her: Love, who grieves me so,My only guide, directs me where to go.I find her not: her every sainted traceSeeks, in bright realms above, her parent starFrom grisly Styx and black Avernus far.
Words in this poem
- lone n.
- A lane. See Loanin.
- trode n.
- Tread; footing. [AS. trod, fr. tredan to tread. See Tread.]
- sere n.
- Claw; talon. Chapman. [F. serre.]
- sainted a.
- Consecrated; sacred; holy; pious.
- styx n.
- The principal river of the lower world, which had to be crossed in passing to the regions of the dead.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Love and He Seek Laura, but Find No Traces of Her Except in the Sky is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Sonnets, Triumphs and Other Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #17650, the various hands translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Petrarch, Love and He Seek Laura, but Find No Traces of Her Except in the Sky, in The Sonnets, Triumphs and Other Poems (1859), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #17650, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/petrarch-sonnets/love-and-he-seek-laura-but-find-no-traces-of-her-except-in-t.html, id L14904.
Form and metre
Love and He Seek Laura, but Find No Traces of Her Except in the Sky is 14 lines in a single stanza. It rhymes ABBAABBACDCDCD, the pattern of the Italian sonnet. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 87%). 91% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.1 syllables. 29% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other Italian sonnets, other poems in iambic pentameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 ABBAABBACDCDCD roadA · flyB · highB · loadA · trodeA · byB · eyeB · show'dA · paceC · soD · goC · traceD · starC · farD
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| That sun, which ever signall'd the right road, | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| Where flash'd her own bright feet, to heaven to fly, | 10 | ·······/·· |
| Returning to the Eternal Sun on high, | 11 | ˘/˘··˘/˘··· |
| Has quench'd my light, and cast her earthly load; | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Thus, lone and weary, my oft steps have trode, | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| As some wild animal, the sere woods by, | 10 | ···/˘˘···· |
| Fleeing with heavy heart and downcast eye | 10 | /˘·/˘··/·· |
| The world which since to me a blank has show'd. | 10 | ·········· |
| Still with fond search each well-known spot I pace | 10 | ·········· |
| Where once I saw her: Love, who grieves me so, | 10 | ·········· |
| My only guide, directs me where to go. | 10 | ·/˘·˘/···· |
| I find her not: her every sainted trace | 10 | ·····/˘/˘· |
| Seeks, in bright realms above, her parent star | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| From grisly Styx and black Avernus far. | 10 | ·/˘······· |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.