MADAME ie ne vous offre rien du mien, ou par ce qu’il est desia vostre, ou pour ce que ie n’y trouue rien digne de vous. Mais i’ay voulu que ces vers en quelque lieu qu’ils se vissent, portassent vostre nom en teste, pour l’honneur que ce leur sera d’auoir pour guide cette grande Corisande d’Andoins.
MADAME, I offer you nothing of my own, either because it is already yours or because I find nothing in it worthy of you. But I wanted these verses, wherever they might be seen, to bear your name at their head, for the honor it will be for them to have as their guide the great Corisande d’Andoins.
Ce present m’a semblé vous estre propre, d’autant qu’il est peu de dames en France, qui iugent mieux, et se seruent plus à propos que vous, de la poësie: et puis qu’il n’en est point qui la puissent rendre viue et animee, comme vous faites par ces beaux et riches accords, dequoy parmy vn milion d’autres beautez, nature vous a estrenee: Madame ces vers meritent que vous les cherissiez: car vous serez de mon aduis, qu’il n’en est point sorty de Gascongne, qui eussent plus d’inuention et de gentillesse, et qui tesmoignent estre sortis d’vne plus riche main.
This present seemed fitting for you, since there are few ladies in France who judge poetry better or make more fitting use of it than you; and since there are none who can make it as lively and animated as you do with those beautiful, rich harmonies with which, among a million other beauties, nature has endowed you. Madame, these verses deserve your cherishing them. For you will agree with me that none have ever come out of Gascony with more invention and grace, or that show they came from a richer hand.
Et n’entrez pas en ialousie, dequoy vous n’auez que le reste de ce que pieça i’en ay faict imprimer sous le nom de Monsieur de Foix, vostre bon parent: car certes ceux-cy ont ie ne sçay quoy de plus vif et de plus bouillant: comme il les fit en sa plus verte ieunesse, et eschauffé d’vne belle et noble ardeur que ie vous diray, Madame, vn iour à l’oreille. Les autres furent faits depuis, comme il estoit à la poursuitte de son mariage, en faueur de sa femme, et sentant desia ie ne sçay quelle froideur maritale. Et moy ie suis de ceux qui tiennent, que la poësie ne rid point ailleurs, comme elle faict en vn subiect folatre et desreglé.
And do not be jealous because you have only what remains after what I long ago had printed under the name of Monsieur de Foix, your good kinsman. For truly these have something livelier and more ardent about them, since he wrote them in his greenest youth, fired by a fine and noble passion that I will tell you about, Madame, one day in your ear. The others were written later, when he was courting for his marriage, in honor of his wife, and already feeling some sort of marital coldness. And I am one of those who hold that poetry never laughs anywhere as it does on a frolicsome and unruly subject.
The sonnets
La Boétie’s twenty-nine love sonnets follow, each rendered line by line.
Pardon amour, pardon, ô Seigneur ie te voüe / Le reste de mes ans, ma voix et mes escris, / Mes sanglots, mes souspirs, mes larmes et mes cris: / Rien, rien tenir d’aucun, que de toy ie n’aduoue. / Helas comment de moy, ma fortune se ioue. / De toy n’a pas long temps, amour, ie me suis ris. / I’ay failly, ie le voy, ie me rends, ie suis pris. / I’ay trop gardé mon cœur, or ie le desaduoüe. / Si i’ay pour le garder retardé ta victoire, / Ne l’en traitte plus mal, plus grande en est ta gloire.
Mercy, Love, mercy! O Lord, I vow to you / The rest of my years, my voice and my writings, / My sobs, my sighs, my tears and my cries: / Nothing, nothing will I own to hold from anyone but you. / Alas, how my fortune makes sport of me! / Not long ago, Love, I laughed at you. / I have erred, I see it; I surrender, I am taken. / I guarded my heart too well; now I disown it. / If by guarding it I delayed your victory, / Do not treat it worse for that: your glory is the greater.
/ Et si du premier coup tu ne m’as abbatu, / Pense qu’vn bon vainqueur et nay pour estre grand, / Son nouueau prisonnier, quand vn coup il se rend, / Il prise et l’ayme mieux, s’il a bien combattu.
/ And if you did not strike me down at the first blow, / Consider that a good victor, born to be great, / Holds his new prisoner, once he surrenders, / In higher esteem and love if he has fought well.
C’est amour c’est amour, c’est luy seul, ie le sens; / Mais le plus vif amour, la poison la plus forte, / A qui onq pauure cœur ait ouuerte la porte. / Ce cruel n’a pas mis vn de ses traitz perçans, / Mais arc, traits et carquois, et luy tout dans mes sens. / Encor vn mois n’a pas, que ma franchise est morte, / Que ce venin mortel dans mes veines ie porte, / Et des-ja i’ay perdu, et le cœur et le sens. / Et quoy? si cest amour à mesure croissoit, / Qui en si grand tourment dedans moy se conçoit? / O croistz, si tu peuz croistre, et amende en croissant.
It is Love, it is Love, it is he alone, I feel it; / But the most piercing love, the strongest poison / To which a poor heart ever opened the door. / This cruel one has not lodged just one of his piercing arrows, / But bow, arrows and quiver, and himself entire, within my senses. / It is not yet a month since my freedom died, / Since I have carried this deadly venom in my veins, / And already I have lost both heart and reason. / What then? If this love kept growing at that rate, / This love conceived within me in such torment? / Oh, grow, if you can grow, and improve as you grow.
/ Tu te nourris de pleurs; des pleurs ie te prometz, / Et pour te refreschir, des souspirs pour iamais. / Mais que le plus grand mal soit au moings en naissant.
/ You feed on tears: tears I promise you, / And to refresh you, sighs forever. / But let the worst pain at least come at the start.
C’est faict mon cœur, quitons la liberté. / Dequoy meshuy seruiroit la deffence, / Que d’agrandir et la peine et l’offence? / Plus ne suis fort, ainsi que i’ay esté. / La raison fust vn temps de mon costé, / Or reuoltée elle veut que ie pense / Qu’il faut seruir, et prendre en recompence / Qu’oncq d’vn tel neud nul ne fust arresté. / S’il se faut rendre, alors il est saison, / Quand on n’a plus deuers soy la raison. / Je voy qu’amour, sans que ie le deserue, / Sans aucun droict, se vient saisir de moy? / Et voy qu’encor il faut à ce grand Roy / Quand il a tort, que la raison luy serue.
It is done, my heart; let us give up our freedom. / What use would defense be now, / Except to increase both the pain and the offense? / I am no longer strong, as I once was. / Reason was on my side for a time; / Now, turned rebel, she would have me think / That I must serve, and take as my reward / That no one was ever held by such a knot. / If one must surrender, then is the time, / When one no longer has reason on one’s side. / I see that Love, though I do not deserve it, / Without any right, comes and seizes me? / And I see that this great King must still / Have reason serve him, even when he is wrong.
C’estoit alors, quand les chaleurs passées, / Le sale Automne aux cuues va foulant, / Le raisin gras dessoubz le pied coulant, / Que mes douleurs furent encommencées. / Le paisan bat ses gerbes amassées, / Et aux caueaux ses bouillans muis roulant, / Et des fruitiers son automne croulant, / Se vange lors des peines aduancées. / Seroit ce point vn presage donné / Que mon espoir est des-ja moissonné? / Non certes, non. Mais pour certain ie pense, / I’auray, si bien à deuiner i’entends, / Si l’on peut rien prognostiquer du temps, / Quelque grand fruict de ma longue esperance.
It was the time when, the heats gone by, / Stained Autumn goes treading in the vats / The plump grape that runs beneath the foot, / That my sorrows began. / The peasant threshes his gathered sheaves, / And, rolling his seething casks into the cellars, / And shaking his autumn harvest down from the fruit trees, / Takes revenge then for the labors he has spent. / Could this be an omen given / That my hope has already been reaped? / No, surely not. But I think for certain / That I shall have, if I know how to divine, / If one can foretell anything from the season, / Some great fruit from my long hope.
I’ay veu ses yeux perçans, i’ay veu sa face claire: / (Nul iamais sans son dam ne regarde les dieux) / Froit, sans cœur me laissa son œil victorieux, / Tout estourdy du coup de sa forte lumiere. / Comme vn surpris de nuit aux champs quand il esclaire / Estonné, se pallist si la fleche des cieux / Sifflant luy passe contre, et luy serre les yeux, / Il tremble, et veoit, transi, Iupiter en colere. / Dy moy Madame, au vray, dy moy si tes yeux vertz / Ne sont pas ceux qu’on dit que l’amour tient couuertz?
I have seen her piercing eyes, I have seen her radiant face / (No one ever looks on the gods without harm to himself); / Her victorious eye left me cold and heartless, / Utterly stunned by the blow of its strong light. / As a man caught at night in the fields when lightning flashes, / Stunned, turns pale if the arrow of the heavens / Whistles past close by him and makes him shut his eyes; / He trembles, and sees, frozen with fear, Jupiter in his wrath. / Tell me, Madame, truly, tell me if your green eyes / Are not those that Love is said to keep covered?
/ Tu les auois, ie croy, la fois que ie t’ay veüe, / Au moins il me souuient, qu’il me fust lors aduis / Qu’amour, tout à vn coup, quand premier ie te vis, / Desbanda dessus moy, et son arc, et sa veüe.
/ You had them, I believe, the time I saw you; / At least I remember that it seemed to me then / That Love, all at once, when I first saw you, / Loosed his bow upon me and unbound his eyes.
Ce dit maint vn de moy, de quoy se plaint il tant, / Perdant ses ans meilleurs en chose si legiere? / Qu’a il tant à crier, si encore il espere? / Et s’il n’espere rien, pourquoy n’est il content? / Quand i’estois libre et sain i’en disois bien autant. / Mais certes celuy là n’a la raison entiere, / Ains a le cœur gasté de quelque rigueur fiere, / S’il se plaint de ma plainte, et mon mal il n’entend. / Amour tout à vn coup de cent douleurs me point, / Et puis l’on m’aduertit que ie ne crie point.
Many a one says of me: “What is he complaining of so much, / Wasting his best years on so frivolous a thing? / Why does he cry out so much, if he still has hope? / And if he hopes for nothing, why is he not content?” / When I was free and healthy, I used to say as much. / But surely that man is not quite in his right mind, / But has his heart spoiled by some proud harshness, / If he complains of my complaint and does not understand my pain. / Love all at once pierces me with a hundred pains, / And then I am told not to cry out.
/ Si vain ie ne suis pas que mon mal i’agrandisse / A force de parler: s’on m’en peut exempter, / Ie quitte les sonnetz, ie quitte le chanter. / Qui me deffend le deuil, celuy là me guerisse.
/ I am not so vain as to magnify my pain / By dint of talking: if someone can free me from it, / I give up sonnets, I give up singing. / Let whoever forbids me to grieve cure me.
Quant à chanter ton los, par fois ie m’aduenture, / Sans oser ton grand nom, dans mes vers exprimer, / Sondant le moins profond de cette large mer, / Ie tremble de m’y perdre, et aux riues m’asseure. / Ie crains en loüant mal, que ie te face iniure.
Sometimes I venture to sing your praise, / Without daring to set down your great name in my verse; / Sounding the shallowest part of this wide sea, / I tremble lest I lose myself in it, and keep safe near the shore. / I fear that by praising badly I may do you wrong.
/ Mais le peuple estonné d’ouir tant t’estimer, / Ardant de te connoistre, essaie à te nommer, / Et cherchant ton sainct nom ainsi à l’aduenture, / Esbloui n’attaint pas à veoir chose si claire, / Et ne te trouue point ce grossier populaire, / Qui n’ayant qu’vn moyen, ne voit pas celuy là: / C’est que s’il peut trier, la comparaison faicte / Des parfaictes du monde, vne la plus parfaicte, / Lors s’il a voix, qu’il crie hardimant la voyla.
/ But the people, amazed to hear you so highly esteemed, / Burning to know you, try to name you, / And, seeking your holy name thus at random, / Dazzled, cannot manage to see a thing so bright; / And the common crowd does not find you, / For, having only one way, it does not see that way: / Namely, if, having made the comparison / Of the perfect women of the world, it can pick out the one most perfect, / Then, if it has a voice, let it boldly cry, “There she is.”
Quand viendra ce iour la, que ton nom au vray passe / Par France, dans mes vers? combien et quantes fois / S’en empresse mon cœur, s’en demangent mes doits? / Souuent dans mes escrits de soy mesme il prend place. / Maugré moy ie t’escris, maugré moy ie t’efface. / Quand astrée viendroit et la foy et le droit, / Alors ioyeux ton nom au monde se rendroit. / Ores c’est à ce temps, que cacher il te face, / C’est à ce temps maling vne grande vergogne / Donc Madame tandis tu seras ma Dourdouigne.
When will that day come when your name, truly told, passes / Through France in my verse? How many, many times / Does my heart press for it, do my fingers itch for it? / Often in my writings it takes its place of its own accord. / Despite myself I write you, despite myself I erase you. / If Astraea should come, and good faith, and justice, / Then your name would joyfully show itself to the world. / As it is, this age makes it hide you; / It is a great shame on this wicked age. / So, Madame, meanwhile you shall be my Dordogne.
/ Toutesfois laisse moy, laisse moy ton nom mettre, / Ayez pitié du temps, si au iour ie te metz, / Si le temps ce cognoist, lors ie te le prometz, / Lors il sera doré, s’il le doit iamais estre.
/ Yet let me, let me set down your name; / Take pity on the age: if I bring you into the light of day, / If the age recognizes you, then I promise you, / Then it will be golden, if it ever is to be.
O entre tes beautez, que ta constance est belle. / C’est ce cœur asseuré, ce courage constant, / C’est parmy tes vertus, ce que l’on prise tant: / Aussi qu’est-il plus beau, qu’vne amitié fidelle? / Or ne charge donc rien de ta sœur infidele, / De Vesere ta sœur: elle va s’escartant / Tousiours flotant mal seure en son cours inconstant. / Voy tu comme à leur gré les vens se ioüent d’elle? / Et ne te repens point pour droict de ton aisnage / D’auoir des-ia choisi la constance en partage.
Oh, among your beauties, how beautiful your constancy is! / It is that steadfast heart, that constant spirit, / That people prize so highly among your virtues: / And indeed what is more beautiful than a faithful love? / So take on nothing from your faithless sister, / From your sister the Vézère: she keeps straying, / Always wavering, unsteady in her fickle course. / Do you see how the winds play with her as they please? / And do not regret having, by right of your seniority, / Already chosen constancy as your share.
/ Mesme race porta l’amitié souueraine / Des bons iumeaux, desquels l’vn à l’autre despart / Du ciel et de l’enfer la moitié de sa part, / Et l’amour diffamé de la trop belle Heleine.
/ The same race bore the sovereign love / Of the good twins, each of whom shares with the other / Half his portion of heaven and of hell, / And the disgraced love of too-beautiful Helen.
Ie voy bien, ma Dourdouigne encore humble tu vas: / De te monstrer Gasconne en France, tu as honte. / Si du ruisseau de Sorgue, on fait ores grand conte, / Si a il bien esté quelquefois aussi bas. / Voys tu le petit Loir comme il haste le pas? / Comme des-ia parmy les plus grands il se conte? / Comme il marche hautain d’vne course plus prompte / Tout à costé du Mince, et il ne s’en plaint pas? / Un seul Oliuier d’Arne enté au bord de Loire, / Le faict courir plus braue et luy donne sa gloire. / Laisse, laisse moy faire.
I see well, my Dordogne, that you still go humbly: / You are ashamed to show yourself a Gascon in France. / If the stream of the Sorgue is now held in great account, / Yet it too was once just as low. / Do you see how the little Loir quickens its pace? / How it already counts itself among the greatest? / How it marches proudly with a swifter course / Right alongside the Mincio, and the Mincio does not complain? / A single Olive tree from the Arno, grafted on the bank of the Loire, / Makes it run more splendidly and gives it its glory. / Leave it, leave it to me.
Et vn iour ma Dourdouigne, / Si ie deuine bien, on te cognoistra mieux: / Et Garonne, et le Rhone, et ces autres grands Dieux / En auront quelque enuie, et possible vergoigne.
And one day, my Dordogne, / If I guess right, you will be better known: / And the Garonne, and the Rhône, and those other great gods / Will feel some envy of it, and perhaps shame.
Toy qui oys mes souspirs, ne me sois rigoureux / Si mes larmes apart toutes miennes ie verse, / Si mon amour ne suit en sa douleur diuerse / Du Florentin transi les regrets languoreux, / Ny de Catulle aussi, le folastre amoureux, / Qui le cœur de sa dame en chatouillant luy perce, / Ny le sçauant amour du migregeois Properce / Ils n’ayment pas pour moy, ie n’ayme pas pour eux. / Qui pourra sur autruy ses douleurs limiter, / Celuy pourra d’autruy les plaintes imiter: / Chacun sent son tourment, et sçait ce qu’il endure. / Chacun parla d’amour ainsi qu’il l’entendit. / Ie dis ce que mon cœur, ce que mon mal me dict.
You who hear my sighs, do not be harsh with me / If I shed my tears apart, all my own, / If my love, in its changing sorrow, does not follow / The languishing laments of the lovelorn Florentine, / Nor those of Catullus, the playful lover, / Who pierces his lady’s heart while tickling it, / Nor the learned love of half-Greek Propertius: / They do not love for me, I do not love for them. / He who can measure his sorrows by another’s / Will be able to imitate another’s laments: / Each feels his own torment and knows what he endures. / Each spoke of love as he understood it. / I say what my heart, what my pain tells me.
/ Que celuy ayme peu, qui ayme à la mesure.
/ How little he loves who loves by measure!
Quoy? qu’est-ce? ô vens, ô nues, ô l’orage! / A point nommé, quand d’elle m’aprochant / Les bois, les monts, les baisses vois tranchant / Sur moy d’aguest vous poussez vostre rage. / Ores mon cœur s’embrase d’auantage. / Allez, allez faire peur au marchant, / Qui dans la mer les thresors va cherchant: / Ce n’est ainsi, qu’on m’abbat le courage. / Quand i’oy les vents, leur tempeste et leurs cris, / De leur malice, en mon cœur ie me ris. / Me pensent ils pour cela faire rendre? / Face le ciel du pire, et l’air aussi: / Ie veux, ie veux, et le declaire ainsi / S’il faut mourir, mourir comme Leandre.
What? What is this? O winds, O clouds, O storm! / Just when, as I draw near her, / I see myself cutting across the woods, the mountains, the valleys, / You lie in wait and hurl your rage upon me. / Now my heart burns all the more. / Go, go and frighten the merchant / Who seeks treasures on the sea: / That is not how my courage is struck down. / When I hear the winds, their tempest and their cries, / I laugh in my heart at their malice. / Do they think they will make me give up for this? / Let the sky do its worst, and the air too: / I wish, I wish, and so declare, / If I must die, to die like Leander.
Vous qui aimer encore ne sçauez, / Ores m’oyant parler de mon Leandre, / Ou iamais non, vous y debuez aprendre, / Si rien de bon dans le cœur vous auez. / Il oza bien branlant ses bras lauez, / Armé d’amour, contre l’eau se deffendre, / Qui pour tribut la fille voulut prendre, / Ayant le frere et le mouton sauuez. / Vn soir vaincu par les flos rigoureux, / Voyant des-ia, ce vaillant amoureux, / Que l’eau maistresse à son plaisir le tourne: / Parlant aux flos, leur iecta cette voix: / Pardonnez moy maintenant que i’y veois, / Et gardez moy la mort, quand ie retourne.
You who do not yet know how to love, / Now that you hear me speak of my Leander, / Now or never you must learn from him, / If you have anything good in your heart. / He dared, waving his water-washed arms, / Armed with love, to defend himself against the water / That took the girl as tribute, / Having spared the brother and the ram. / One evening, overcome by the cruel waves, / This valiant lover, seeing already / That the water, his mistress, was turning him at its pleasure, / Spoke to the waves and cast them these words: / “Spare me now, as I go there, / And keep my death for when I return.”
O cœur leger, ô courage mal seur, / Penses-tu plus que souffrir ie te puisse? / O bontez creuze, ô couuerte malice, / Traitre beauté, venimeuse douceur, / Tu estois donc tousiours sœur de ta sœur? / Et moy trop simple il falloit que i’en fisse / L’essay sur moy? et que tard i’entendisse / Ton parler double et tes chants de chasseur? / Depuis le iour que i’ay prins à t’aimer, / I’eusse vaincu les vagues de la mer. / Qu’est-ce meshuy que ie pourrais attendre? / Comment de toy pourrais i’estre content? / Qui apprendra ton cœur d’estre constant, / Puis que le mien ne le luy peut aprendre?
O fickle heart, O unreliable spirit, / Do you think I can bear you any longer? / O hollow kindness, O hidden malice, / Treacherous beauty, venomous sweetness, / Were you then always your sister’s sister? / And I, too simple, had to make / The trial of it on myself? And understand too late / Your double speech and your hunter’s songs? / Since the day I began to love you, / I could have conquered the waves of the sea. / What can I expect from now on? / How could I be content with you? / Who will teach your heart to be constant, / Since mine cannot teach it?
Ce n’est pas moy que l’on abuse ainsi: / Qu’à quelque enfant ses ruses on employe, / Qui n’a nul goust, qui n’entend rien qu’il oye: / Ie sçay aymer, ie sçay hayr aussi. / Contente toy de m’auoir iusqu’icy / Fermé les yeux, il est temps que i’y voye: / Et que mes-huy, las et honteux ie soye / D’auoir mal mis mon temps et mon soucy, / Oserois tu m’ayant ainsi traicté / Parler à moy iamais de fermeté? / Tu prens plaisir à ma douleur extreme: / Tu me deffends de sentir mon tourment: / Et si veux bien que ie meure en t’aimant. / Si ie ne sens, comment veux-tu que i’ayme?
I am not one to be deceived like this: / Use your tricks on some child / Who has no taste and understands nothing he hears: / I know how to love, I know how to hate as well. / Be content with having until now / Kept my eyes shut; it is time I saw clearly, / And that from now on I be weary and ashamed / Of having spent my time and care so badly. / Would you dare, having treated me so, / Ever to speak to me of constancy? / You take pleasure in my extreme pain; / You forbid me to feel my torment; / And yet you want me to die loving you. / If I do not feel, how do you expect me to love?
O l’ay ie dict? helas l’ay ie songé? / Ou si pour vray i’ay dict blaspheme telle? / S’a fauce langue, il faut que l’honneur d’elle / De moy, par moy, desus moy, soit vangé, / Mon cœur chez toy, ô madame, est logé: / Là donne luy quelque geene nouuelle: / Fais luy souffrir quelque peine cruelle: / Fais, fais luy tout, fors luy donner congé. / Or seras tu (ie le sçay) trop humaine, / Et ne pourras longuement voir ma peine. / Mais vn tel faict, faut il qu’il se pardonne? / A tout le moins haut ie me desdiray / De mes sonnets, et me desmentiray, / Pour ces deux faux, cinq cent vrais ie t’en donne.
Oh, did I say it? Alas, did I dream it? / Or did I truly speak such blasphemy? / Come then, false tongue: her honor must be / Avenged on me, by me, upon me. / My heart, Madame, is lodged with you: / There give it some new torture; / Make it suffer some cruel pain; / Do, do everything to it but send it away. / But you will be (I know it) too kind, / And will not be able to watch my suffering for long. / But such a deed—must it be pardoned? / At the very least I will loudly retract / My sonnets and give myself the lie: / For these two false ones, I give you five hundred true.
Si ma raison en moy s’est peu remettre, / Si recouurer astheure ie me puis, / Si i’ay du sens, si plus homme ie suis / Ie t’en mercie, ô bien heureuse lettre. / Qui m’eust (helas) qui m’eust sçeu recognoistre / Lors qu’enragé vaincu de mes ennuys, / En blasphemant madame ie poursuis? / De loing, honteux, ie te vis lors paroistre / O sainct papier, alors ie me reuins, / Et deuers toy deuotement ie vins. / Ie te donrois vn autel pour ce faict, / Qu’on vist les traicts de cette main diuine. / Mais de les voir aucun homme n’est digne, / Ny moy aussi, s’elle ne m’en eust faict.
If my reason has been able to return to me, / If I can now recover myself, / If I have sense, if I am a man again, / I thank you for it, O most blessed letter. / Who (alas), who could have recognized me / When, enraged, overcome by my griefs, / I went on blaspheming my lady? / From afar, ashamed, I saw you then appear, / O holy paper; then I came back to myself, / And came devoutly toward you. / I would give you an altar for this deed, / Where all might see the strokes of that divine hand. / But no man is worthy to see them, / Nor I either, had she not made me so.
I’estois prest d’encourir pour iamais quelque blasme. / De colere eschauffé mon courage brusloit, / Ma fole voix au gré de ma fureur branloit, / Ie despitois les dieux, et encore ma dame. / Lors qu’elle de loing iette vn breuet dans ma flamme / Ie le sentis soudain comme il me rabilloit, / Qu’aussi tost deuant luy ma fureur s’en alloit, / Qu’il me rendoit, vainqueur, en sa place mon ame. / Entre vous, qui de moy, ces merueilles oyez, / Que me dites vous d’elle? et ie vous prie voyez, / S’ainsi comme ie fais, adorer ie la dois? / Quels miracles en moy, pensez vous qu’elle fasse / De son œil tout puissant, ou d’vn ray de sa face.
I was about to incur some lasting blame. / Heated by anger, my heart was burning; / My mad voice reeled at the whim of my fury; / I defied the gods, and my lady too. / When she from afar casts a little note into my flame, / I felt at once how it set me right again, / How before it my fury immediately departed, / How, victorious, it gave me back my soul in its place. / You who hear these marvels of me, / What do you say of her? And see, I beg you, / Whether I should adore her as I do. / What miracles do you think she works in me / With her all-powerful eye, or with one ray of her face,
/ Puis qu’en moy firent tant les traces de ses doigts.
/ Since the marks of her fingers worked so much in me?
Ie tremblois deuant elle, et attendois, transi, / Pour venger mon forfaict quelque iuste sentence, / A moy mesme consent du poids de mon offence, / Lors qu’elle me dict, va, ie te prens à mercy. / Que mon loz desormais par tout soit esclarcy: / Employe là tes ans: et sans plus, mes-huy pense / D’enrichir de mon nom par tes vers nostre France, / Couure de vers ta faute, et paye moy ainsi. / Sus donc ma plume, il faut, pour iouyr de ma peine / Courir par sa grandeur, d’vne plus large veine. / Mais regarde à son œil, qu’il ne nous abandonne. / Sans ses yeux, nos esprits se mourroient languissants.
I trembled before her and, frozen with fear, awaited / Some just sentence to avenge my crime, / Aware myself of the weight of my offense, / When she said to me: “Go, I grant you mercy. / Let my praise from now on shine out everywhere: / Spend your years on that; and from this day think only / Of enriching our France with my name through your verses; / Cover your fault with verse, and pay me so.” / Up then, my pen: to reap the fruit of my pains / We must range over her greatness in an ampler vein. / But watch her eye, lest it abandon us. / Without her eyes our spirits would languish and die.
/ Ils nous donnent le cœur, ils nous donnent le sens. / Pour se payer de moy, il faut qu’elle me donne.
/ They give us heart, they give us sense. / For her to be paid by me, she must first give to me.
O vous maudits sonnets, vous qui printes l’audace / De toucher à madame: ô malings et peruers, / Des Muses le reproche, et honte de mes vers: / Si ie vous feis iamais, s’il faut que ie me fasse / Ce tort de confesser vous tenir de ma race, / Lors pour vous, les ruisseaux ne furent pas ouuerts / D’Appollon le doré, des muses aux yeux verts, / Mais vous receut naissants Tisiphone en leur place. / Si i’ay oncq quelque part à la postérité / Ie veux que l’vn et l’autre en soit desherité.
O you accursed sonnets, you who had the audacity / To touch upon my lady: O spiteful and perverse, / Reproach of the Muses and shame of my verse: / If ever I made you, if I must do myself / The wrong of confessing that you are of my stock, / Then for you the streams were not opened / Of golden Apollo and the green-eyed Muses, / But Tisiphone received you at your birth in their place. / If I ever have any share in posterity, / I want both the one and the other of you disinherited of it.
/ Et si au feu vangeur des or ie ne vous donne, / C’est pour vous diffamer, viuez chetifs, viuez, / Viuez aux yeux de tous, de tout honneur priuez / Car c’est pour vous punir, qu’ores ie vous pardonne.
/ And if I do not give you at once to the avenging fire, / It is to disgrace you: live, wretches, live, / Live before the eyes of all, stripped of all honor, / For it is to punish you that I now pardon you.
N’ayez plus mes amis, n’ayez plus cette enuie / Que ie cesse d’aimer, laissez moy obstiné, / Viure et mourir ainsi, puis qu’il est ordonné, / Mon amour c’est le fil, auquel se tient ma vie. / Ainsi me dict la fée, ainsi en Æagrie / Elle feit Meleagre à l’amour destiné, / Et alluma sa souche à l’heure qu’il fust né, / Et dict, toy, et ce feu, tenez vous compaignie.
Have no more, my friends, have no more this wish / That I should cease to love; leave me, obstinate, / To live and die this way, since it is so decreed: / My love is the thread on which my life hangs. / So the fairy told me; so in Aeagria / She made Meleager destined for love, / And lit his log at the hour he was born, / And said: “You and this fire, keep each other company.”
/ Elle le dict ainsi, et la fin ordonnée / Suyuit apres le fil de cette destinée, / La souche (ce dict lon) au feu fut consommée, / Et deslors (grand miracle) en vn mesme moment / On veid tout à vn coup, du miserable amant / La vie et le tison, s’en aller en fumée.
/ So she said, and the appointed end / Followed after along the thread of that destiny; / The log (so they say) was consumed in the fire, / And then (great miracle) in one and the same moment / Were seen all at once, of the wretched lover, / The life and the brand going up in smoke.
Quand tes yeux conquerans estonné ie regarde, / I’y veoy dedans à clair tout mon espoir escript, / I’y veoy dedans amour, luy mesme qui me rit, / Et m’y monstre mignard le bon heur qu’il me garde. / Mais quand de te parler par fois ie me hazarde, / C’est lors que mon espoir desseiché se tarit. / Et d’aduouer iamais ton œil, qui me nourrit, / D’vn seul mot de saueur, cruelle tu n’as garde. / Si tes yeux sont pour moy, or voy ce que ie dis, / Ce sont ceux-là, sans plus, à qui ie me rendis. / Mon Dieu quelle querelle en toy mesme se dresse, / Si ta bouche et tes yeux se veulent desmentir.
When, stunned, I gaze into your conquering eyes, / I see in them, clearly written, all my hope; / I see in them Love himself, smiling at me, / And sweetly showing me the happiness he keeps for me. / But when at times I venture to speak to you, / It is then that my hope dries up and runs out. / And to vouch, ever, for your eye that feeds me / With one word of favor, cruel one, you never will. / If your eyes are for me—now mark what I say— / They are the ones, and no others, to whom I surrendered. / My God, what a quarrel rises within you / If your mouth and your eyes mean to give each other the lie.
/ Mieux vaut, mon doux tourment, mieux vaut les departir, / Et que ie prenne au mot de tes yeux la promesse.
/ Better, my sweet torment, better to settle between them, / And let me take your eyes at their word and keep their promise.
Ce sont tes yeux tranchans qui me font le courage / Ie veoy saulter dedans la gaye liberté, / Et mon petit archer, qui mene à son costé / La belle gaillardise et plaisir le volage. / Mais apres, la rigueur de ton triste langage / Me montre dans ton cœur la fiere honnesteté / Et condamné ie veoy la dure chasteté, / Là grauement assise et la vertu sauuage, / Ainsi mon temps diuers par ces vagues se passe. / Ores son œil m’appelle, or sa bouche me chasse. / Helas, en cest estrif, combien ay i’enduré.
It is your piercing eyes that give me courage: / I see gay freedom leaping in them, / And my little archer, who leads at his side / Lovely high spirits and fickle pleasure. / But afterward the severity of your stern speech / Shows me proud honor in your heart, / And, condemned, I see hard chastity / Gravely seated there, and fierce virtue. / So my changing time passes on these waves: / Now her eye calls me, now her mouth drives me off. / Alas, in this strife, how much I have endured!
/ Et puis qu’on pense auoir d’amour quelque asseurance, / Sans cesse nuict et iour à la seruir ie pense, / Ny encor de mon mal, ne puis estre asseuré.
/ And then let anyone think he has some assurance in love! / Ceaselessly, night and day, I think of serving her, / And still I cannot be sure even of my suffering.
Or dis-ie bien, mon esperance est morte. / Or est-ce faict de mon aise et mon bien. / Mon mal est clair: maintenant ie veoy bien, / I’ay espousé la douleur que ie porte. / Tout me court sus, rien ne me reconforte, / Tout m’abandonne et d’elle ie n’ay rien, / Sinon tousiours quelque nouueau soustien, / Qui rend ma peine et ma douleur plus forte. / Ce que i’attends, c’est vn iour d’obtenir / Quelques soupirs des gens de l’aduenir: / Quelqu’vn dira dessus moy par pitié: / Sa dame et luy nasquirent destinez, / Egalement de mourir obstinez, / L’vn en rigueur, et l’autre en amitié.
Now I can truly say my hope is dead. / Now it is all over with my ease and my good. / My ill is plain: now I see clearly / I have wedded the grief I bear. / Everything assails me, nothing comforts me, / Everything forsakes me, and from her I get nothing / But ever some new prop / That makes my pain and my grief the stronger. / What I wait for is one day to win / A few sighs from the people of times to come: / Someone will say over me, out of pity: / “His lady and he were born destined, / Equally obstinate in dying, / The one in harshness, the other in love.”
I’ay tant vescu, chetif, en ma langueur, / Qu’or i’ay veu rompre, et suis encor en vie, / Mon esperance auant mes yeux rauie, / Contre l’escueil de sa fiere rigueur. / Que m’a seruy de tant d’ans la longueur? / Elle n’est pas de ma peine assouuie: / Elle s’en rit, et n’a point d’autre enuie, / Que de tenir mon mal en sa vigueur. / Donques i’auray, mal’heureux en aimant / Tousiours vn cœur, tousiours nouueau tourment. / Ie me sens bien que i’en suis hors d’halaine, / Prest à laisser la vie soubs le faix: / Qu’y feroit-on sinon ce que ie fais? / Piqué du mal, ie m’obstine en ma peine.
I have lived so long, wretched, in my languor, / That now I have seen—and am still alive— / My hope, snatched away before my eyes, broken / Against the reef of her proud harshness. / What good to me has been the length of so many years? / She is not sated with my pain: / She laughs at it, and has no other wish / Than to keep my suffering in full vigor. / So I shall have, unhappy in loving / Always one heart, always fresh torment. / I feel that I am quite out of breath, / Ready to give up my life under the burden: / What could one do but what I am doing? / Stung by suffering, I persist in my pain.
Puis qu’ainsi sont mes dures destinées, / I’en saouleray, si ie puis, mon soucy. / Si i’ay du mal, elle le veut aussi. / I’accompliray mes peines ordonnées. / Nymphes des bois qui auez estonnées, / De mes douleurs, ie croy quelque mercy, / Qu’en pensez vous? puis-ie durer ainsi, / Si à mes maux trefues ne sont donnees? / Or si quelqu’vne à m’escouter s’encline, / Oyez pour Dieu ce qu’ores ie deuine. / Le iour est pres que mes forces ia vaines / Ne pourront plus fournir à mon tourment. / C’est mon espoir, si ie meurs en aymant, / A donc, ie croy, failliray-ie à mes peines.
Since such are my hard destinies, / I shall glut my care with them, if I can. / If I suffer, she wills it too. / I shall fulfill my appointed pains. / Nymphs of the woods, who have been stunned by my sorrows / Into some pity, I believe, / What do you think? Can I last like this / If no truce is granted to my ills? / Now if one of you is inclined to hear me, / Listen, for God’s sake, to what I now foresee: / The day is near when my strength, already spent, / Will no longer be able to keep up with my torment. / It is my hope that if I die loving, / Then, I believe, I shall be done with my pains.
Lors que lasse est, de me lasser ma peine, / Amour d’vn bien mon mal refreschissant, / Flate au cœur mort ma playe languissant, / Nourrit mon mal, et luy faict prendre alaine, / Lors ie conçoy quelque esperance vaine: / Mais aussi tost, ce dur tyran, s’il sent / Que mon espoir se renforce en croissant, / Pour l’estoufer, cent tourmens il m’ameine / Encor tous frez: lors ie me veois blasmant / D’auoir esté rebelle à mon tourmant. / Viue le mal, ô dieux, qui me deuore, / Viue à son gré mon tourmant rigoureux. / O bien-heureux, et bien-heureux encore / Qui sans relasche est tousiours mal’heureux.
When my pain is weary of wearying me, / Love, refreshing my ill with some good, / Soothes my languishing wound in my dead heart, / Feeds my ill and lets it catch its breath; / Then I conceive some vain hope: / But at once this harsh tyrant, if he feels / My hope growing stronger as it grows, / Brings me a hundred torments to stifle it, / All fresh again: then I find myself blaming myself / For having rebelled against my torment. / Long live the ill, O gods, that devours me! / Long live my harsh torment, as it pleases! / O happy, and happy again, / He who without respite is always unhappy!
Si contre amour ie n’ay autre deffence / Ie m’en plaindray, mes vers le maudiront, / Et apres moy les roches rediront / Le tort qu’il faict à ma dure constance. / Puis que de luy i’endure cette offence, / Au moings tout haut, mes rithmes le diront, / Et nos neueus, alors qu’ils me liront, / En l’outrageant, m’en feront la vengeance. / Ayant perdu tout l’aise que i’auois, / Ce sera peu que de perdre ma voix. / S’on sçait l’aigreur de mon triste soucy, / Et fut celuy qui m’a faict cette playe, / Il en aura, pour si dur cœur qu’il aye, / Quelque pitié, mais non pas de mercy.
If I have no other defense against Love, / I shall complain of him; my verses will curse him, / And after me the rocks will repeat / The wrong he does to my hard constancy. / Since I endure this offense from him, / At least my rhymes will proclaim it aloud, / And our descendants, when they read me, / Will avenge me by reviling him. / Having lost all the ease I had, / It will be little to lose my voice. / If the bitterness of my sad care is known, / Even he who dealt me this wound, / However hard a heart he has, / Will feel some pity for it—but no mercy.
Ia reluisoit la benoiste iournée / Que la nature au monde te deuoit, / Quand des thresors qu’elle te reseruoit / Sa grande clef, te fust abandonnée. / Tu prins la grace à toy seule ordonnée, / Tu pillas tant de beautez qu’elle auoit: / Tant qu’elle, fiere, alors qu’elle te veoit / En est par fois, elle mesme estonnée. / Ta main de prendre en fin se contenta: / Mais la nature encor te presenta, / Pour t’enrichir cette terre ou nous sommes. / Tu n’en prins rien: mais en toy tu t’en ris, / Te sentant bien en auoir assez pris / Pour estre icy royne du cœur des hommes.
Already the blessed day was shining / That nature owed the world in you, / When the great key to the treasures / She had kept for you was handed over to you. / You took the grace meant for you alone; / You plundered so many of the beauties she had / That she, proud as she is, when she sees you, / Is at times stunned at it herself. / At last your hand was content to take no more: / But nature offered you as well, / To enrich you, this earth where we live. / You took none of it, but laughed to yourself, / Well aware that you had taken enough / To be queen here of the hearts of men.