Poetry blogging, Day 5
Apr. 5th, 2009 07:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
Just for fun, here is a poem we read in my medieval lit class a couple of months ago. Had Penthouse Forum existed in the twelfth century, I'm sure Duke William would have been an avid contributor.
Farai un vers
William IX, translated by Frederick Goldin
I shall make a vers, since I am sleeping,
and walking around, and standing in the sun.
Well, there are ladies who are all wrongheaded,
and I can say who:
the ones who turn down the love of a knight
and treat it badly.
A lady who does not love a loyal knight
commits a great mortal sin.
But if she loves a cleric or a monk,
she is in error:
her they should burn by right
with firebrands.
In Auvergne, beyond Limousin,
I was walking alone, on the sly,
I met the wives of En Garin
and En Bernard.
They greeted me modestly in the name
of Saint Leonard.
One of them says to me with her high-class speech:
"God save you, my lord pilgrim,
you look to me like a gentleman,
as far as I can tell;
but we all see crazy fools too often
walking through the world."
Now you are going to hear how I answered them:
I didn't say but or bat to them,
didn't mention a stick or a tool,
but only this:
"Babariol, babariol,
babarian."
Then Agnes says to Ermessen:
"We've found what we are looking for.
Sister, for the love of God let us take him in,
he is really mute,
with this one what we have in mind
will never get found out."
One of them took me under her mantle
and brought me in to her chamber, by the fireplace.
Let me tell you, I liked it,
and the fire was good,
and I gladly warmed myself
by the big coals.
To eat they gave me capons,
and you can be sure I had more than two,
and there was no cook or cook's boy there,
but just the three of us,
and the bread was white, and the wine was good,
and the pepper plentiful.
"Sister, this man is tricky,
he's stopped talking just for us.
Let us bring in our red cat
right now,
it'll make him talk soon enough
if he's fooling us."
Agnes went for that disgusting animal,
and it was big, it had a long mustache,
and I, when I saw it, among us, there,
I got scared,
I nearly lost my courage
and my nerve.
When we had drunk and eaten,
I took my clothes off, to oblige them.
They brought the cat up behind me,
it was vicious.
One of them pulls it down my side,
down to my heel.
She gets right to it and pulls the cat down
by the tail, and it scratches:
they gave me more than a hundred sores
that time;
but I wouldn't have budged an inch
if they killed me.
"Sister," Agnes says to Ermessen,
"he's mute, all right.
So, Sister, let us get ourselves a bath
and unwind."
Eight days and more I stayed
in that oven.
I fucked them, you shall hear how many times:
one hundred and eighty-eight times. C.LXXX.VIII.
I nearly broke my breeching strap
and harness.
And I cannot tell the vexation,
it hurt so bad.
No, no, I cannot tell the vexation,
it hurt so bad.
Farai un vers
William IX, translated by Frederick Goldin
I shall make a vers, since I am sleeping,
and walking around, and standing in the sun.
Well, there are ladies who are all wrongheaded,
and I can say who:
the ones who turn down the love of a knight
and treat it badly.
A lady who does not love a loyal knight
commits a great mortal sin.
But if she loves a cleric or a monk,
she is in error:
her they should burn by right
with firebrands.
In Auvergne, beyond Limousin,
I was walking alone, on the sly,
I met the wives of En Garin
and En Bernard.
They greeted me modestly in the name
of Saint Leonard.
One of them says to me with her high-class speech:
"God save you, my lord pilgrim,
you look to me like a gentleman,
as far as I can tell;
but we all see crazy fools too often
walking through the world."
Now you are going to hear how I answered them:
I didn't say but or bat to them,
didn't mention a stick or a tool,
but only this:
"Babariol, babariol,
babarian."
Then Agnes says to Ermessen:
"We've found what we are looking for.
Sister, for the love of God let us take him in,
he is really mute,
with this one what we have in mind
will never get found out."
One of them took me under her mantle
and brought me in to her chamber, by the fireplace.
Let me tell you, I liked it,
and the fire was good,
and I gladly warmed myself
by the big coals.
To eat they gave me capons,
and you can be sure I had more than two,
and there was no cook or cook's boy there,
but just the three of us,
and the bread was white, and the wine was good,
and the pepper plentiful.
"Sister, this man is tricky,
he's stopped talking just for us.
Let us bring in our red cat
right now,
it'll make him talk soon enough
if he's fooling us."
Agnes went for that disgusting animal,
and it was big, it had a long mustache,
and I, when I saw it, among us, there,
I got scared,
I nearly lost my courage
and my nerve.
When we had drunk and eaten,
I took my clothes off, to oblige them.
They brought the cat up behind me,
it was vicious.
One of them pulls it down my side,
down to my heel.
She gets right to it and pulls the cat down
by the tail, and it scratches:
they gave me more than a hundred sores
that time;
but I wouldn't have budged an inch
if they killed me.
"Sister," Agnes says to Ermessen,
"he's mute, all right.
So, Sister, let us get ourselves a bath
and unwind."
Eight days and more I stayed
in that oven.
I fucked them, you shall hear how many times:
one hundred and eighty-eight times. C.LXXX.VIII.
I nearly broke my breeching strap
and harness.
And I cannot tell the vexation,
it hurt so bad.
No, no, I cannot tell the vexation,
it hurt so bad.
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Date: 2009-04-06 07:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-04-06 06:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-04-06 03:31 pm (UTC)