The Remembrance of the Past Enhances His Misery
When I look back upon the many yearsWhich in their flight my best thoughts have entomb'd,And spent the fire, that, spite her ice, consumed,And finish'd the repose so full of tears,Broken the faith which Love's young dream endears,And the two parts of all my blessing doom'd,This low in earth, while heaven has that resumed,And lost the guerdon of my pains and fears,I wake, and feel me to the bitter windSo bare, I envy the worst lot I see;Self-terror and heart-grief on me so wait.O Death, O Fate, O Fortune, stars unkind!O day for ever dark and drear to me!How have ye sunk me in this abject state!
Words in this poem
- guerdon n.
- A reward; requital; recompense; -- used in both a good and a bad sense. [OF. guerdon, guerredon, LL. widerdonum (influenced by L. donum gift, cf. Donation ), fr. OHG. widarl; widar again, against (G. wider wieder) + lon reward, G. lo]
- unkind a.
- Having no race or kindred; childless. [See Kin kindred.]
- drear n.
- Sadness; dismalness.
- abject a.
- Cast down; low-lying. [L. abjectus, p. p. of abjicere to throw away; ab + jacere to throw. See Jet a shooting forth.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Remembrance of the Past Enhances His Misery 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, The Remembrance of the Past Enhances His Misery, in The Sonnets, Triumphs and Other Poems (1859), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #17650, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/petrarch-sonnets/the-remembrance-of-the-past-enhances-his-misery.html, id L14889.
Form and metre
The Remembrance of the Past Enhances His Misery 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%). 96% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.0 syllables. 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 yearsA · entomb'dB · consumedB · tearsA · endearsA · doom'dB · resumedB · fearsA · windC · seeD · waitC · unkindD · meC · stateD
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 |
|---|---|---|
| When I look back upon the many years | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Which in their flight my best thoughts have entomb'd, | 10 | ········˘/ |
| And spent the fire, that, spite her ice, consumed, | 10 | ···/····˘/ |
| And finish'd the repose so full of tears, | 10 | ·/˘·˘/···· |
| Broken the faith which Love's young dream endears, | 10 | /˘······˘/ |
| And the two parts of all my blessing doom'd, | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| This low in earth, while heaven has that resumed, | 10 | ·····/··˘/ |
| And lost the guerdon of my pains and fears, | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| I wake, and feel me to the bitter wind | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| So bare, I envy the worst lot I see; | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Self-terror and heart-grief on me so wait. | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| O Death, O Fate, O Fortune, stars unkind! | 10 | ·····/˘·˘/ |
| O day for ever dark and drear to me! | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| How have ye sunk me in this abject state! | 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.