On April 6, 1327, after Petrarch gave up his vocation as a priest, he caught the sight of a woman called Laura.Petrarch wrote a collection of 366 poems. There is little information in Petrarch's work about Laura, except that she is lovely to look at, fair-haired, with a modest, dignified bearing. Laura and Petrarch had little or no personal contact, She refused him for the very proper reason that she was already married to another man. He expressed his feelings into love poems that were exclamatory rather than persuasive. On her death in 1348, he found that his grief was difficult to live with. Later in his "Letter to Posterity", Petrarch wrote:
"In my younger days I struggled constantly with an overwhelming but pure love affair – my only one, and I would have struggled with it longer had not premature death, bitter but salutary for me, extinguished the cooling flames. I certain wish I could say that I have always been entirely free from desires of the flesh, but I would be lying if I did".
Petrarch is best known for his Italian poetry, most famous was the Canzoniere "Songbook" and the Trionfi "Triumphs". However, Petrarch was a Latin scholar and did most of his writing in this language. Another one would be Secretum "My Secret Book", an personal, guilt-ridden imaginary dialogue. Petrarch's poetry was often set to music after his death, especially by Italian madrigal composers of the Renaissance in the 16th century.
"In my younger days I struggled constantly with an overwhelming but pure love affair – my only one, and I would have struggled with it longer had not premature death, bitter but salutary for me, extinguished the cooling flames. I certain wish I could say that I have always been entirely free from desires of the flesh, but I would be lying if I did".
Petrarch is best known for his Italian poetry, most famous was the Canzoniere "Songbook" and the Trionfi "Triumphs". However, Petrarch was a Latin scholar and did most of his writing in this language. Another one would be Secretum "My Secret Book", an personal, guilt-ridden imaginary dialogue. Petrarch's poetry was often set to music after his death, especially by Italian madrigal composers of the Renaissance in the 16th century.
She ruled in beauty o'er this heart of mine,
A noble lady in a humble home,
And now her time for heavenly bliss has come,
'Tis I am mortal proved, and she divine.
The soul that all its blessings must resign,
And love whose light no more on earth finds room,
Might rend the rocks with pity for their doom,
Yet none their sorrows can in words enshrine;
They weep within my heart; and ears are deaf
Save mine alone, and I am crushed with care,
And naught remains to me save mournful breath.
Assuredly but dust and shade we are,
Assuredly desire is blind and brief,
Assuredly its hope but ends in death.
A noble lady in a humble home,
And now her time for heavenly bliss has come,
'Tis I am mortal proved, and she divine.
The soul that all its blessings must resign,
And love whose light no more on earth finds room,
Might rend the rocks with pity for their doom,
Yet none their sorrows can in words enshrine;
They weep within my heart; and ears are deaf
Save mine alone, and I am crushed with care,
And naught remains to me save mournful breath.
Assuredly but dust and shade we are,
Assuredly desire is blind and brief,
Assuredly its hope but ends in death.
Other than writing to poems he would write letters to dead people. The powerful people in history he needed to ask questions and get inspiration by.