Sonnet CXCV
I lived so tranquil, with my lot content,No sorrow visited, nor envy pined,To other loves if fortune were more kindOne pang of mine their thousand joys outwent;But those bright eyes, whence never I repentThe pains I feel, nor wish them less to find,So dark a cloud and heavy now does blind,Seems as my sun of life in them were spent.O Nature! mother pitiful yet stern,Whence is the power which prompts thy wayward deeds,Such lovely things to make and mar in turn?True, from one living fount all power proceeds:But how couldst Thou consent, great God of Heaven,That aught should rob the world of what thy love had given?
Words in this poem
- repent a.
- Prostrate and rooting; -- said of stems. Gray. [L. repens, -entis, creeping, p. pr. of repere to creep.]
- wayward a.
- Taking one's own way; disobedient; froward; perverse; willful. [OE. weiward, for aweiward, i. e., turned away. See Away, and -ward.]
- aught n.
- Property; possession. [AS. , fr. agan to own, p. p. ahte.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Sonnet CXCV 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, Sonnet CXCV, in The Sonnets, Triumphs and Other Poems (1859), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #17650, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/petrarch-sonnets/sonnet-cxcv.html, id L14791.
Form and metre
Sonnet CXCV 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 89%). 98% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.2 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 14% 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 contentA · pinedB · kindB · outwentA · repentA · findB · blindB · spentA · sternC · deedsD · turnC · proceedsD · heavenC · givenD
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 |
|---|---|---|
| I lived so tranquil, with my lot content, | 10 | ···/˘···˘/ |
| No sorrow visited, nor envy pined, | 10 | ·/˘/˘˘·/˘· |
| To other loves if fortune were more kind | 10 | ·/˘··/˘··· |
| One pang of mine their thousand joys outwent; | 10 | ·····/˘·˘/ |
| But those bright eyes, whence never I repent | 10 | ·····/˘·˘/ |
| The pains I feel, nor wish them less to find, | 10 | ·········· |
| So dark a cloud and heavy now does blind, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Seems as my sun of life in them were spent. | 10 | ·········· |
| O Nature! mother pitiful yet stern, | 10 | ·/˘/˘/˘˘·· |
| Whence is the power which prompts thy wayward deeds, | 10 | ···/···/˘· |
| Such lovely things to make and mar in turn? | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| True, from one living fount all power proceeds: | 10 | ···/˘··/˘/ |
| But how couldst Thou consent, great God of Heaven, | 11 | ····˘/···/˘ |
| That aught should rob the world of what thy love had given? | 12 | ···········/ |
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.