Daytime, short as it may be, is better than night.
Love and flowers do not last but one spring.
Sorrow is always a companion of pleasure.
He who does not love is miserable, and miserable is he who does.
Youth is our real treasure; all the rest of our years are winter.
Nature ornant la dame qui devait De sa douceur forcer les plus rebelles, Lui fit présent des beautés les plus belles, Que dès mille ans en épargne elle avait.Tout ce qu’Amour avarement couvait De beau, de chaste et d’honneur sous ses ailes, Emmiella les grâces immortelles De son bel œil, qui les Dieux émouvait.Du ciel à peine elle était descendue Quand je la vu, quand mon âme éperdue En devint folle, et d’un si poignant traitLe fier Destin l’engrava dans mon âme, Que, vif ne mort, jamais d’une autre dame Empreint au cœur je n’aurai le portrait.
Nature withheld Cassandra in the skies For more adornment a full thousand years; She took their cream of Beauty’s fairest dyes, And shap’d and tinted her above all Peers: Meanwhile Love kept her dearly with his wings, And underneath their shadow fill’d her eyes With such a richness that the cloudy Kings Of high Olympus utter’d slavish sighs. When from the Heavens I saw her first descend My heart took fire, and only burning pains They were my pleasures — they my Life’s sad end; Love pour’d her beauty into my warm veins.
Le premier livre des Amours (1550); John Keats, tr., "A Sonnet of Ronsard" (c. 1818)
Mignonne, allons voir si la rose Qui ce matin avoit desclose Sa robe de pourpre au Soleil, A point perdu ceste vesprée Les plis de sa robe pourprée. Et son teint au vostre pareil.Las! voyez comme en peu d’espace, Mignonne, elle a dessus la place Las, las, ses beautez laissé cheoir! O vrayment marastre Nature, Puis qu’une telle fleur ne dure Que du matin jusques au soir!Donc, si vous me croyez mignonne, Tandis que vostre âge fleuronne En sa plus verte nouveauté, Cueillez, cueillez vostre jeunesse: Comme à ceste fleur la vieillesse Fera ternir vostre beauté.
See, Mignonne, hath not the Rose, That this morning did unclose Her purple mantle to the light, Lost, before the day be dead, The glory of her raiment red, Her colour, bright as yours is bright?Ah, Mignonne, in how few hours, The petals of her purple flowers All have faded, fallen, died; Sad Nature, mother ruinous, That seest thy fair child perish thus ’Twixt matin song and even tide.Hear me, my darling, speaking sooth, Gather the fleet flower of your youth, Take ye your pleasure at the best; Be merry ere your beauty flit, For length of days will tarnish it Like roses that were loveliest.
Les Odes, livre I, 27: «À Cassandre (À Sa Maistresse)»; Andrew Lang, tr., "The Rose" in Ballads and Lyrics of Old France (London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1872), pp. 25–6; see also: Robert Mezey, tr., "Corinna in Vendome" in The Kenyon Review, vol. 19, no 1 (1957), revised in The Lovemaker: Poems (1961)
Fleur Angevine de quinze ans, Ton front monstre assez de simplesse: Mais ton cœur ne cache au-dedans Sinon que malice et finesse, Celant sous ombre d’amitié Une jeunette mauvaistié.Ren moy (si tu as quelque honte) Mon cœur que je t’avois donné, Dont tu ne fais non-plus de conte Que d’un esclave emprisonné, T’esjouyssant de sa misere, Et te plaisant de luy desplaire.Une autre moins belle que toy, Mais bien de meilleure nature, Le voudroit bien avoir de moy. Elle l’aura, je te le jure: Elle l’aura, puis qu’autrement Il n’a de toy bon traitement.Mais non: j’aime trop mieux qu’il meure Sans esperance en ta prison: J’aime trop mieux qu’il y demeure Mort de douleur contre raison, Qu’en te changeant jouïr de celle Qui m’est plus douce, et non si belle.
Fair flower of fifteen springs, that still Art scarcely blossomed from the bud, Yet hast such store of evil will, A heart so full of hardihood, Seeking to hide in friendly wise The mischief of your mocking eyes.If you have pity, child, give o’er; Give back the heart you stole from me, Pirate, setting so little store On this your captive from Love’s sea, Holding his misery for gain, And making pleasure of his pain.Another, not so fair of face, But far more pitiful than you, Would take my heart, if of his grace, My heart would give her of Love’s due; And she shall have it, since I find That you are cruel and unkind.Nay, I would rather that it died, Within your white hands prisoning, Would rather that it still abide In your ungentle comforting. Than change its faith, and seek to her That is more kind, but not so fair.
Les Amours, livre II, 25b; Andrew Lang, tr., "To His Young Mistress" in Ballads and Lyrics of Old France (1872), pp. 28–9
