He watched me, still as a stone,
Speaking no more than an animal,
And I thought perhaps he had
No brain to speak with, nor a tongue.
So I got up my courage and I said:
“You, tell me, what are you,
Good, or evil, or what?”
And he answered: “I am a man.”
“What kind of man?” “The kind
You see. I’m nothing but myself.”
“And what are you doing?” “I’m here,
Guarding this herd near this wood.”
“Guarding them? By Saint Peter in Rome!
No one commands these beasts.
And how could you guard such savage
Creatures in an open field
Or a wood or anywhere else
If they’re neither tied nor shut in?”
“I guard them so carefully, and so well,
That they’d never leave this place.”
“Ridiculous! Tell me the truth!”
“Not one of them would move an inch
If he saw me coming …
But no one else could do this,
Just me. Anyone approaching
That herd would be killed at once.
And so I am the lord of my animals.”
***
When the storm had completely vanished
I saw so many birds
In that pine tree (could anyone believe me?)
That it looked as if every branch,
Every twig, was hidden by birds.
And the tree was even lovelier,
For the birds all sang at once,
In marvelous harmony, though each
Was singing its proper song
And not a note that belonged
To one was sung by another.
And I gloried in their happiness,
Listening as they sang their service
Through, unhurried: I’d never
Heard joy so complete,
And no one else will hear it,
I think, unless he goes there
And can hear what filled me with joy
And rapture so deep that I was carried
Away—
***
Hi Friends,
Today’s poem-a-day is a sampling from the first two sections of Yvain: The Knight of the Lion by the twelfth-century French poet Chrétien de Troyes, as translated by the twentieth-century poet and professor Burton Raffel. The original is in Old French, octosyllabic rhyming couplets, and 6,818 lines long.
Enjoy.
Ellen