The Poems of Giacomo Leopardi

This wearisome and this distressing sleep
That we call life

my eyes
Were filled with tears, that could not be suppressed;

The conflict fierce of love I felt, and said:
If this be love, how hard it is to bear!

With eyes still fixed intent upon the ground,
I saw but her,

His base desires and appetites to feed,
Excites your hatred and your scorn