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Michelangelo - Sonnet XXIX - The first day I beheld so much unique beauty
Identifier
024467
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
A description of the experience
Michelangelo – Sonnets [translated by Elizabeth Jennings]
Sonnet XXIX
The first day I beheld so much unique
Beauty, I trusted that I might be one
Who, like the eagle soaring to the sun,
Finds such a radiance makes its own eyes weak.
The fault was mine; I knew that I had failed,
Since he who follows angels and lacks wings
Is sowing seed on stone, his words are whirled
Away by wind; God takes his questionings.
My heart will not support me when I know
So great a beauty's near; my eyes grow blind
Though, from a distance, it persuades, me still.
What will become of me? What guide will show
Some value in myself I still may find
When near, you burn me, when far off, you kill.