Dante's Divine Comedy

 

I have at times seen all the eastern sky

becoming rose as day began and seen,

adorned in lovely blue, the rest of heaven;

and seen the sun's face rise so veiled that it

was tempered by the mist and could permit

they eye to look at length upon it

(Purgatorio Canto XXX, lines 21 - 27)

O godly force, if you so lend yourself

to me, that I might show the shadow of

the blessed realm inscribed within my mind,

then you would see me underneath the tree

you love; there I shall take as crown the leaves

of which my theme and you shall make me worthy

(Paradiso Canto I, lines 22 - 27)

Then Beatrice looked at me with eyes so full

of sparks of love, eyes so divine that my

own force of sight was overcome, took flight,

and, eyes downcast, I almost lost my senses.

(Paradiso Canto IV, lines 139 - 142)

And I saw many lights, alive, most bright;

we formed the center, they became a crown,

their voices even sweeter than their splendor

(Paradiso Canto V, lines 64 - 66)

for like the sun that strikes the frailest eyes,

so does the memory of her sweet smile

deprive me of the use of my own mind.

From that first day when, in this life, I saw

her face, until I had this vision, no

thing ever cut the sequence of my song,

but now I must desist from this pursuit,

in verses, of her loveliness, just as

each artist who has reached his limit must.

(Paradiso Canto XXX, lines 25 - 33)