From gazing very often upon thine
In the sore hope to shed those tears they keep;
And at such time, thou mak’st the pent tears rise
Even to the brim, till the eyes waste and pine;
Yet cannot they, while thou art present, weep.
At length, by the constant sight of this lady, mine eyes began to be gladdened overmuch with her company; through which thing many times I had much unrest, and rebuked myself as a base person: also, many times I cursed the unsteadfastness of mine eyes, and said to them inwardly: “Was not your grievous condition of weeping wont one while to make others weep? And will ye now forget this thing because a lady looketh upon you? who so looketh merely in compassion of the grief ye then showed for your own blessed lady. But whatso ye can, that do ye, accursed eyes! many a time will I make you remember it! for never, till death dry you up, should ye make an end of your weeping.” And when I had spoken thus unto mine eyes, I was taken again with extreme and grievous sighing. And to the end that this inward strife which I had undergone might not be hidden from all saving the miserable wretch who endured it, I proposed to write a sonnet, and to comprehend in it this horrible condition. And I wrote this which begins, “The very bitter weeping.”
The sonnet has two parts. In the first, I speak to my eyes, as my heart spoke within myself. In the second, I remove a difficulty, showing who it is that speaks thus: and this part begins here, “So far.” It well might receive other divisions also; but this would be useless, since it is manifest by the preceding exposition.
“The very bitter weeping that ye made
So long a time together, eyes of mine,
Was wont to make the tears of pity shine