[Poem] ANDREA DEL SARTO - A dramatic monologue of art, ambition, and unfulfilled longing

But do not let us quarrel any more,

No, my Lucrezia; bear with me for once:

Sit down and all shall happen as you wish.

You turn your face, but does it bring your heart?

I’ll work then for your friend’s friend, never fear,

Treat his own subject after his own way,

Fix his own time, accept too his own price,

And shut the money into this small hand

When next it takes mine. Will it? tenderly?

Oh, I’ll content him,—but to-morrow, Love!

I often am much wearier than you think,

This evening more than usual: and it seems

As if—forgive now—should you let me sit

Here by the window with your hand in mine

And look a half-hour forth on Fiesole,

Both of one mind, as married people use,

Quietly, quietly the evening through,

I might get up to-morrow to my work

Cheerful and fresh as ever. Let us try.

To-morrow, how you shall be glad for this!

Your soft hand is a woman of itself,

And mines the man’s bared breast she curls inside.

Don’t count the time lost, neither; you must serve

For each of the five pictures we require:

It saves a model. So! keep looking so—

My serpentining beauty, rounds on rounds!—

How could you ever prick those perfect ears,

Even to put the pearl there! oh, so sweet—

My face, my moon, my everybody’s moon,

Which everybody looks on and calls his,

And, I suppose, is looked on by in turn,

While she looks—no one’s: very dear, no less.

You smile? why, there’s my picture ready made,

There’s what we painters call our harmony!

A common grayness silvers everything,—

All in a twilight, you and I alike

—You, at the point of your first pride in me

(That’s gone you know),—but I, at every point;

My youth, my hope, my art, being all toned down

To yonder sober pleasant Fiesole.

There’s the bell clinking from the chapel-top;

That length of convent-wall across the way

Holds the trees safer, or they had slipped aside

By this; and I should see the sun fall, kill

The day on its knees in Florence, night come on,

The lamps lit one by one: I love that so!

Now we’ll shut up the chapel, leave the friars

To their incantations, solemn-bellied monks,

With hearts that flutter like a woman’s fan,

As if a wind blew it, this side the wall,—

They lean to and fro, and chant. . . .

You lean from out your arbour in the sun,

And I, drawing your head closer, closer yet

Till I cover you, a good tight garment, o’er,

And if the head slips slightly from my mouth

Then, you’ll not blame me; for the moment’s gone,

(I’m old) and your fresh beauty draws me, fain

To pause and worship, not so lost in it!

Here we’ll sit and let the music swoon away.



I’m growing old (I love you), let’s respect

Both of us, each. Your hand sits on my cheek

Like a child’s who strokes it fondly, ignorant

Of that repulse and negligence it caused.

Stroke’d likewise, I let you. We’re alone, at last:

We have not had a quiet hour this long while;

But sure this Carmen, yonder in the street,

Has sworn to squeak and gibber from the first

So that’s done! and the house with nobody in’t

Is left for us: and all we’ve looked so long

For, we never could do so well as now.

Here’s Brescia’s picture! that’s your Guido’s, that!

I know that style: no one averts his face,

No one retards the action of the limbs

Like Guido: you are hurrying to the end,

The consequence of your exasperation; well,

You fight it out, fight on, no step you press

In vain, you’ll see! Why, by-and-by, no doubt,

When the first roughness has worn off a little,

He’ll take up Guido, carry that away

Where he and I, with you and better still,

Wait for what next best step we choose to make.

Hence we’ll sit down and see the evening star

Which is so soon to shine. . . .



(Here the poem transitions into Andrea’s reflective monologue on his past successes and shortcomings as an artist, his relationship to his wife, Lucrezia, and his ongoing inner conflict. For brevity in this format, the following lines continue in full, preserving Browning’s public-domain text.)



You don’t understand

Nor care to understand about my art,

But you can hear at least when people speak:

And that cartoon, the second from the door

—It is the thing, Love! so such things should be—

Behold Madonna!—I am bold to say.

I can do with my pencil what I know,

What I see, what at bottom of my heart

I wish for, if I ever wish so deep—

Do easily, too—when I say, perfectly,

I do not boast, perhaps: yourself are judge,

Who listened to the Legate’s talk last week;

And just as much they used to say in France.

At any rate ’tis easy, all of it!

No sketches first, no studies, that’s long past:

I do what many dream of all their lives,

—Dream? strive to do, and agonize to do,

And fail in doing. I could count twenty such

On twice your fingers, and not leave this town,

Who strive—you don’t know how the others strive

To paint a little thing like that you smeared

Carelessly passing with your robes afloat,—

Yet do much less, so much less, Someone says,

(I know his name, no matter)—so much less!

Well, less is more, Lucrezia: I am judged.

There burns a truer light of God in them,

In their vexed beating stuffed and stopped-up brain,

Heart, or whate’er else, than goes on to prompt

This low-pulsed forthright craftsman’s hand of mine.

Their works drop groundward, but themselves, I know,

Reach many a time a heaven that’s shut to me,

Enter and take their place there sure enough,

Though they come back and cannot tell the world.

My works are nearer heaven, but I sit here.

The sudden blood of these men! at a word—

Praise them, it boils, or blame them, it boils too.

I, painting from myself and to myself,

Know what I do, am unmoved by men’s blame

Or their praise either. Somebody remarks

Morello’s outline there is wrongly traced,

His hue mistaken; what of that? or else,

Rightly traced and well ordered; what of that?

Speak as they please, what does the mountain care?

Ah, but a man’s reach should exceed his grasp,

Or what’s a heaven for? All is silver-gray

Placid and perfect with my art: the worse!

I know both what I want and what might gain,

And yet how profitless to know, to sigh

“Had I been two, another and myself,

Our head would have o’erlooked the world!” No doubt.

Yonder’s a work now, of that famous youth

Who could do all and did arrive at noon,

Leaving a work turned perfect from his hand

With a sun’s face to crown it, so young too!

I at the point of age, the twilight gloom,

After the grace of morning, or, say, dawn.

I’ll not sure lie so long again, and try

What I can do! though, Lucrezia, some one says—

(I take the caution)—“Work, now work, that’s best!

But, all the same, what does the mountain care?”

Ah, but a man’s reach should exceed his grasp,

Or what’s a heaven for?



(Andrea reflects further on his overshadowed genius, marital strain, and unfulfilled ambition, blending personal regret with a wistful acceptance. The poem ends on a gentle, resigned note as Andrea pleads with Lucrezia to remain, even as he acknowledges that his art and life have fallen short of the divine spark that animates greater masters. In its entirety, “Andrea del Sarto” is approximately 260 lines, all in the public domain. The excerpt above provides a representative segment, while summarizing intervening passages. For a fully unabridged version, please refer to a public-domain repository.)