Grief for a golden garment unto me; And, in the holding of my dear Love's hand, ANDRÉ LE CHAPELAIN (Clerk of Love, 1170) HIS PLAINT TO VENUS OF THE COMING YEARS "Plus ne suis ce que j'ay esté Et ne le sçaurois jamais estre; QUEEN VENUS, round whose feet, To tend thy sacred fire, With service bitter-sweet Nor youths nor maidens tire;— Large as the un-oared sea ;— Mother, whose eldest born First stirred his stammering tongue In the world's youngest morn, Hear thou one suppliant more! Shall the youths jeer and jape, "Behold his verse doth dote,— Leave thou Love's lute to scrape, And tune thy wrinkled throat To songs of Flesh is Grass,'' Shall they cry thus and pass? And the sweet girls go by? "Beshrew the grey-beard's tune!— What ails his minstrelsy To sing us snow in June!" Shall they too laugh, and fleet Far in the sun-warmed street? But Thou, whose beauty bright, The wan sun seeketh still ;- Have pity, Erycine! Withhold not all thy sweets; Must I thy gifts resign For Love's mere broken meats; And suit for alms prefer Must I, as bondsman, kneel That none shall aught refuse To Love's own secrecy;— Avert, avert it, Queen! Let me at least be seen An usher in thy courts, Outworn, but still indued With badge of servitude. When I no more may go, As one who treads on air, To string-notes soft and slow, By maids found sweet and fair When I no more may be Of Love's blithe company ; When I no more may sit Within thine own pleasance, To weave, in sentence fit, Thy golden dalliance; When other hands than these Record thy soft decrees ; Leave me at least to sing Thy mirth, thy festival; [Here ended Andre's words : But One, that writeth, saithBetwixt his stricken chords He heard the Wheels of Death And knew the fruits Love bare But Dead-Sea apples were.] |