"Rudel to the Lady of Tripoli": Rudel symbolizes his love as the
aspiration of the sunflower that longs only to become like the sun,
so losing a flower's true grace, while the sun does not even
perceive the flower. He imagines himself as a pilgrim revealing to
the Lady of Tripoli by means of this symbol the entire sinking of
self in his love for her. Even men's praise of his songs is no more
to him than the bees which bask on a sunflower are to it.
Rudel was a Provencal troubadour, and lived in the twelfth century.
The Crusaders, returning from the East, spread abroad wonderful
reports of the beauty, learning, and wit of the Countess of Tripoli,
a small duchy on the Mediterranean, north of Palestine. Rudel,
although never having seen her, fell in love with her and composed
songs in honor of her beauty, and finally set out to the East in
pilgrim's garb. On his way he was taken ill, but lived to reach the
port of Tripoli. The countess, being told of his arrival, went on
board the vessel. When Rudel heard she was coming, he revived, said
she had restored him to life by her coming, and that he was willing
to die, having seen her. He died in her arms; she gave him a rich
and honorable burial in a sepulchre of porphyry on which were
engraved verses in Arabic.