“I’d sing of Love in such a novel fashion/that from her cruel side I would draw by force/ a thousand sighs a day, kindling again in her cold mind a thousand high desires.”
Petrarch proclaims his aptitude to sing innovatively in manner that would contract his lover’s spite. The charming, compelling singing would awaken spiteful lover’s passion. Love would condense the aloofness in the woman paving way for the passion of affection.
If no love is, O God what feel I so?/And if love is, what thing and which is he?/If love be good, from whence cometh my woo?
The three continuous rhetoric queries at the beginning of Sonnet 102 specify that Petrarch cannot recognize whether he is undergoing Eros or not. Petrarch wonders what love is and why it would provoke woos in his life if it is a worthy sentiment. The application of ‘if’ insinuates that Petrarch is almost persuaded that his emotional state could be attributed to Eros.
“And if that I consente, I wrongfully/ Compleyne, iwis, Thus possed to and from,/AI streeless withinne a boot am I/amydde the see, betwixne wyndes two/That in contraries stonden ever emo./Allas! What is this wonder maladie?/ For hete of cold, for cold of hete, I dye.”
Petrarch acknowledges that he senses that he is circumnavigating a boat in a profound sea amidst robust winds. The misperception that he is undergoing is comparable to a malady that equivocates him between coldness and hotness contemporaneously.
Ways apt and new to sing of love I’d find,/ Forcing from her hard heart full many a sigh,/And re-kindle in her frozen mind/Desire a thousand, passionate and high./
Petrarch is preoccupied with songs that he would use to rouse the erotic urge of his lover. He is confident that the melodies would provoke the lover’s amorous sighs. The lover’s sighs would deduce that she has submitted Petrarch’s love. For Petrarch, singing is an impetus for carnal passion.
