A Daily Countdown to 700 Years with the “colpi d’Amor”
“Benedetto sia ‘l giorno, et ‘l mese, et l’anno, / et la stagione, e’l tempo, et l’ora, e ‘l punto…” — Rvf 61
“Blessed be the day, and the month, and the year, and the season, and the time, and the hour, and the moment…”(Kline).
Amor piangeva, et io con lui talvolta,
dal qual miei passi non fur mai lontani,
mirando per gli effecti acerbi et strani
l’anima vostra dei suoi nodi sciolta.
Or ch’al dritto camin l’à Dio rivolta,
col cor levando al cielo ambe le mani
ringratio lui che’ giusti preghi humani
benignamente, sua mercede, ascolta.
Et se tornando a l’amorosa vita,
per farvi al bel desio volger le spalle,
trovaste per la via fossati o poggi,
fu per mostrar quanto è spinoso calle,
et quanto alpestra et dura la salita,
onde al vero valor conven ch’uom poggi.
Love wept, and sometimes I wept with him,
from whom my steps never strayed far,
gazing, since the effect was bitter and strange,
at your spirit, set loose from all Love’s bonds.
Now God has returned you to the true way,
I lift my hands with all my heart to heaven,
thankful to him who in his mercy listens
benignly to honest human prayers.
And if in returning to the loving path,
you found hills and ditches in your way
enough to almost make you turn back,
it was to show how thorny is the road,
and how mountainous and hard the climb,
if a man would find where true worth lies.