Sonnet XXX | Je vois avec vos beaux yeux un douce lumière

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by Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475 - 1564)

Translation © by Guy Laffaille

Veggio co' be' vostr'occhi un dolce lume

Language: Italian (Italiano)

Our translations: ENG FRE LIT SPA SPA

  Veggio co' be' [vostr'occhi]¹ un dolce lume
che co' mie ciechi già veder non posso;
porto co' vostri piedi un pondo addosso,
che de' mie zoppi non è già costume.

  Volo con le vostr'ale senza piume;
col [vostro ingegno]² al ciel sempre son mosso;
dal [vostro arbitrio]³ son pallido e rosso,
freddo al sol, caldo alle più fredde brume.

  Nel voler vostro è sol la voglia mia,
i miei pensier nel vostro cor si fanno,
nel vostro fiato son le mie parole.

  Come luna da sé sol par ch'io sia,
ché gli occhi nostri in ciel veder non sanno
se non quel tanto che n'accende il sole.

Available sung texts: (what is this?)

• B. Britten

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View original text (without footnotes)
¹ Britten: "vostri occhi"
² Britten: "vostr'ingegno"
³ Britten: "vostr'arbitrio"

Text Authorship:

by Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475 - 1564), no title, appears in Rime, no. 89 [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

by (Edward) Benjamin Britten (1913 - 1976), "Sonetto XXX", op. 22 no. 3 (1940), published 1943 [ voice and piano ], from Seven Sonnets of Michelangelo, no. 3 [sung text checked 1 time]
by Jeanne Leleu (1898 - 1979), "Veggio co' be' vostr' occhi un dolce lume", 1924, published 1925 [ medium voice and piano or orchestra ], from Sonnets de Michel-Ange Buonarroti, no. 2, Paris, Éd. 'Au Ménestrel' Heugel, also set in French (Français) [sung text not yet checked]

Settings in other languages, adaptations, or excerpts:

Also set in French (Français), a translation by Michel Augustin Varcollier (1795 - 1883) , appears in Poésies de Michel-Ange Buonarroti, peintre, sculpteur et architecte florentin, Paris, Éd. Hesse et Cie., first published 1826 ; composed by Jeanne Leleu.
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Also set in German (Deutsch), a translation by Rainer Maria Rilke (1875 - 1926) , no title, appears in Michelangelo-Übertragungen ; composed by Christoph Alexander Garbe, Willy Kehrer, Harald Lie, Anton Schoendlinger.
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Also set in Polish (Polski), a translation by Leopold Staff (1878 - 1957) ; composed by Romuald Twardowski.
- Go to the text. [Note: the text is not in the database yet.]

Other available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

ENG English (John Addington Symonds) , "To Tommaso de' Cavalieri: Love the light-giver", appears in The Sonnets of Michael Angelo Buonarroti and Tommaso Campanella now for the first time translated into rhymed English, first published 1878
GER German (Deutsch) (Hermann Friedrich Grimm) , "An Tommaso Cavalieri", from Michelangelo: Gedichte und Briefe, first published 1907

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 14
Word count: 111

Sonnet XXX

Language: French (Français) after the Italian (Italiano)

Je vois avec vos beaux yeux un douce lumière,
Que pourtant avec mes yeux aveugles je ne peux voir ;
Je porte avec vos pieds un poids sur mon dos,
Ce dont je suis incapable avec les faibles miens.

Je vole sans plumes avec vos ailes ;
Avec votre esprit vers le ciel je suis toujours tourné,
Par votre volonté, je pâlis ou je rougis,
J'ai froid au soleil, j'ai chaud dans le temps le plus froid.

Dans votre vouloir est seulement ma volonté,
Mes pensées sont nées dans votre cœur,
Dans votre souffle sont mes paroles.

Comme la lune, je suis seul,
Que nos yeux ne peuvent pas voir dans le ciel
Sauf si elle est illuminée par le soleil.

Text Authorship:

Translation from Italian (Italiano) to French (Français) copyright © 2015 by Guy Laffaille, (re)printed on this website with kind permission. To reprint and distribute this author's work for concert programs, CD booklets, etc., you may ask the copyright-holder(s) directly or ask us; we are authorized to grant permission on their behalf. Please provide the translator's name when contacting us.
Contact: licenses@email.lieder.example.net

Based on:

a text in Italian (Italiano) by Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475 - 1564), no title, appears in Rime, no. 89
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This text was added to the website: 2015-08-29
Line count: 14
Word count: 119