Pace non trovo

As I have already mentioned in this blog, this year I have started to study English Literature, Language and Culture at university (UNED). I must admit that I feel totally enthusiastic about the subject on English Literature until XVIIIth century. I may have probably discovered my real vocation (and not accounting standards and taxonomies and this stuff).

The most amazing piece of poetry I have read so far (gold medal for it) is a translation by Sir Thomas Wyatt the Elder (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Wyatt_(poet)) of a sonnet by Petrach: "pace non trovo" (for a translation in Spanish and for the original text in Italian, refer to http://webpages.ull.es/users/bhernanp/literatura/wyatt.htm). The text in modern English reads as follows:

I find no peace and all my war is done.
I fear and hope, I burn and freeze like ice.
I fly above the wind yet can I not arise.
And naught I have and all the world I seize on.
That looseth nor locketh, holdeth me in prison
and holdeth me not, yet can I scape no wise;
nor letteth me live nor die at my device
and yet of death is given me occasion.
Without eyes I see and without tongue I plain.
I desire to perish and yet I ask health.
I love another and thus I hate myself.
I feed me in sorrow and laugh in all my pain.
Likewise displeaseth me both death and life,
and my delight is causer of this strife.

Wow! I wonder how such a short text (no more than 200 words) can contain such a powerful cry from the poet, a cry from a suffering spirit who cannot find his place on Earth, a cry from someone stuck in a difficult situation he has not created (Sir Thomas Wyatt was often involved in many "love affaires" in the Englisch court), a cry for someone who knows he cannot reach hapineess whatever direction he takes. The metaphors in the first four verses are just amazing: it is such an outstanding start for such a short structure as a sonnet... But the remaining ten verses are also full of powerful methapores and figures, not a single word of them is useless.

I dunno, you probably are wondering what has happened to my brain to have written this post, but the truth is that I am discovering poetry (English poetry for the time being) in my life. Not everything in the world must be related to work, computers,...