When sere leaf falleth
from the high forkèd tips,
And cold appalleth
dry osier, haws and hips,
Coppice he strips
of bird, that now none calleth.
Fordel[1] my lips
in love have, though he galleth.
Though all things freeze here,
I can naught feel the cold,
For new love sees, here
my heart's new leaf unfold;
So am I rolled
and lapped against the breeze here:
Love who doth mould
my force, force guarantees here.
Aye, life's a high thing,
where joy's his maintenance,
Who cries 'tis wry thing
hath danced never my dance,
I can advance
no blame against fate's tithing
For lot and chance
have deemed the best thing my thing.
Of love's wayfaring
I know no part to blame,
All other paring,
compared, is put to shame,
Man can acclaim
no second for comparing
With her, no dame
but hath the meaner bearing.
I'ld ne'er entangle
my heart with other fere,
Although I mangle
my joy by staying here
I have no fear
that ever at Pontrangle
You'll find her peer
or one that's worth a wrangle.
She'd ne'er destroy
her man with cruelty
'Twixt here 'n' Savoy
there feeds no fairer she,
Than pleaseth me
till Paris had ne'er joy
In such degree
from Helena in Troy.
She's so the rarest
who holdeth me thus gay,
The thirty fairest
can not contest her sway;
'Tis right, par fay,
thou know, O song that wearest
Such bright array,
whose quality thou sharest.
Chançon, nor stay
till to her thou declarest:
"Arnaut would say
me not, wert thou not fairest."
"Lancan son passat" shows the simple and presumably early style of
Arnaut, with the kind of reversal from more or less trochaic to more or
less iambic movement in fifth and eighth lines, a _kind_ of rhythm taken
over by Elizabethan lyricists. Terms trochaic and iambic are, however,
utterly inaccurate when applied to syllabic metres set to a particular
melody:
Lancan son passat li giure
E noi reman puois ni comba,
Et el verdier la flors trembla
Sus el entrecim on poma,
La flors e li chan eil clar quil
Ab la sazon doussa e coigna
M'enseignon c'ab joi m'apoigna,
Sai al temps de l'intran d'April.