DONNA, DEO MI DIRA ... | GOD WILL, O LADY, SAY ... |
Guido Guinizelli | tr. Peter Dean |
Donna, Deo mi dira: "Che presomisti?" siando l’alma mia a lui davanti. "Lo ciel passasti e ‘nfin a Me venisti, e desti in vano amor Me per semblanti; ch’a Me conven le laude e a la reina del regname degno, per cui cessa onne fraude." Dir Li poro: "Tenne d’angel sembianza che fosse del Tuo regno; non me fu fallo, s’in lei posi amanza." |
"What gave you right?" God will, o Lady, say to me when I present myself above. "You come to me - heaven passing on the way - claiming to see divinity in mortal love; to me belongs that praise and to this kingdom’s worthy queen whose virtue all sin stays." But I’ll reply to Him: "In everything she seemed just what Your angels would have been: I did no wrong to love, no wrong in loving." |
Trans. Copyright © Peter Dean 2002