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Villon, François: The ballad of dead ladies (Ballade des dames du temps jadis in English)

Portre of Villon, François

Ballade des dames du temps jadis (French)

Dictes-moy où, n’en quel pays,
Est Flora, la belle Romaine?
Archipiade, ne Thaïs,
Qui fut sa cousine germaine?
Echo, parlant quand bruyt on maine
Dessus rivière ou sus estan,
Qui beaulté eut trop plus qu’humaine?…
Mais où’ sont les neiges d’antan!

Où est la très-sage Heloïs,
Pour qui fut chastré et puis moyne
Pierre Esbaillart, à Sainct-Denys?
Pour son amour eut cest essoyne.
Semblablement, où est la Royne
Qui commanda que Buridan
Fust fetté en ung sac en Seine?
Mais où sont les neiges d’antan!

La royne Blanche comme ung lys,
Qui chantoit à voix de seraine,
Berthe au grand pied, Beatrix, Allys,
Haremburgis, qui tint le Mayne,
Et Jehanne, la bonne Lorraine,
Qu’Anglois bruslerent à Rouen:
Où sont-ils? Vierge souveraine?…
Mais où sont les neiges d’antan!

Envoi

Prince, n’enquerez, de sepmaine,
Où elles sont, ne de cest an,
Car ce refrain le vous remaine:
Mais où sont les neiges d’antan!



PublisherBudapest, Magvető Kiadó
Source of the quotationSzerb Antal: Száz vers. Negyedik kiadás. 116, 118. p.

The ballad of dead ladies (English)

Tell me now in what hidden way is
Lady Flora the lovely Roman?
Where's Hipparchia, and where is Thais,
Neither of them the fairer woman?
Where is Echo, beheld of no man,
Only heard on river and mere,--
She whose beauty was more than human?...
But where are the snows of yester-year?

Where's Héloise, the learned nun,
For whose sake Abeillard, I ween,
Lost manhood and put priesthood on?
(From Love he won such dule and teen!)
And where, I pray you, is the Queen
Who willed that Buridan should steer
Sewed in a sack's mouth down the Seine?...
But where are the snows of yester-year?

White Queen Blanche, like a queen of lilies,
With a voice like any mermaiden,--
Bertha Broadfoot, Beatrice, Alice,
And Ermengarde the lady of Maine,--
And that good Joan whom Englishmen
At Rouen doomed and burned her there,--
Mother of God, where are they then?...
But where are the snows of yester-year?

Envoi

Nay, never ask this week, fair lord,
Where they are gone, nor yet this year,
Save with this much for an overword,--
But where are the snows of yester-year?

 



Source of the quotationhttp://www.poetry-archive.com

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