#48 
Dante Alighieri
I want to be as grating in my words
as that beautiful stone in her deeds
who every moment petrifies and takes on
greater hardness and a harsher nature
and arms her body with jasper
because of which, or just because she ducks,
no arrow ever came
from quiver that could strike her where she's bare;
but she can kill - no use putting armor on
or running from her killing blows,
which, as if they had wings,
strike flesh and break every weapon to pieces;
so that I don't know what to do with her and can't defend myself.

I find no shield she does not shatter,
no place to hide from her look;
because, like a flower on a stalk,
she takes hold of the summit of my soul;
she seems as worried by my suffering
as a ship by a sea that lifts no wave
and a burden founders me
no poetry is equal to.
O fearful and pitiless rasp
that silently grates away my life,
why don't you refrain from gnawing through my heart from crust to crust,
as I from telling who it is that gives you power?

For my heart trembles more - whenever I think
of her being where someone else's eyes could see her-
for fear lest my thought shine out and be discovered,
than I tremble for death, which is already
eating, with the teeth of Love, all my senses;
I mean, my thought feeds
on their vitality and thus slows down their action.
Love has struck me to the ground, and now stands over me
with the same sword he used to murder Dido,
and I cry out to him for mercy, and humbly beg him,
and he looks dead-set against all mercy.
Again and again he lifts his hand and menaces
my feeble life, this unholy one
who holds me stretched out
on my back on the ground, too weary to move:
then shrieks rise in my mind
and my blood, that was dispensed in my veins,
fleeing, courses back
to my heart, that calls it back; I am left white.
He wounds me under my left arm
so badly, the pain surges up in my heart again:
then I say, "If he lifts his hand
again, Death shall lock me up
before the blow comes down."

Would that I could see him cleave
the heart of that cruel woman who tears mine to pieces;
then death would not be a black 
thing to me, who runs toward death for her beauty,
because she strikes as hard in the sun as in the shade,
this thief, this murderous cutthroat.
O why does she not howl
for me, as I for her, in the burning pit?
because I'd cry out, right away, "I'll help you!"
and I would, willingly; into that yellow hair
that Love curls up and makes gold to ruin me
I would put my hand; and then she'd love me.

Once I had those lovely tresses in my hand
that have come to be my whips and scourges,
grabbing them before terce
I'd keep hold of them through vespers and the
evening bell;
And I would not be courteous or merciful,
but like a bear at play;
and though Love whips me with them now,
I'd take revenge a thousand times.

And then into those eyes, where the sparks fly out
that inflame my murdered heart,
I would look deep, without moving,
to take revenge on her for fleeing me;
and then when she gave me love, I would give her peace.

Song, go straight to that Lady
who has hurt my heart and robs me
of what I most hunger for
and put an arrow through her heart: attack!
For sweet honor is won through getting back.

(e dalle per lo cor d'una saetta:
che bell'onor s'acquista in far vendetta.)

From rg08