VI

Now chant prepare, And melody To please The king, who'll judge thy sheaves.

Worth, sad, Sneaks Here; double employ Hath there. Get thee Plates Full, and cates, Gifts, go! Nor lurk Here till decrees Reverse, And ring thou take.

Straight t' Arago I'd ply Cross the wide seas But "Rome" disturbs my hearing.

_Coda._

At midnight mirk, In secrecies I nurse My served make[7]

In heart; nor try My melodies At other's door nor mearing.[8]

The eleventh canzo is mainly interesting for the opening ba.s.s onomatopia of the wind rowting in the autumn branches. Arnaut may have caught his alliteration from the joglar engles, a possible hrimm-hramm-hruffer, though the device dates at least from Naevius.

En breu brisaral temps braus, Eill bisa busina els brancs Qui s'entreseignon trastuich De sobreclaus rams de fuoilla; Car noi chanta auzels ni piula M' enseign' Amors qu'ieu fa.s.sa adonc Chan que non er segons ni tertz Ans prims d'afrancar cor agre.

The rhythm is too tricky to be caught at the first reading, or even at the fifth reading; there is only part of it in my copy.

Briefly bursteth season brisk, Blasty north breeze racketh branch, Branches rasp each branch on each Tearing twig and tearing leaf.a.ge, Chirms now no bird nor cries querulous; So Love demands I make outright A song that no song shall surpa.s.s For freeing the heart of sorrow.

Love is glory's garden close, And is a pool of prowess staunch Whence get ye many a goodly fruit If true man come but to gather.

Dies none frost bit nor yet snowily, For true sap keepeth off the blight Unless knave or dolt there pa.s.s....

The second point of interest is the lengthening out of the rhyme in _piula, niula_, etc. In the fourth strophe we find:

The gracious thinking and the frank Clear and quick perceiving heart Have led me to the fort of love.

Finer she is, and I more loyal Than were Atlanta and Meleager.

Then the quiet conclusion, after the noise of the opening, Pensar de lieis m'es repaus:

To think of her is my rest And both of my eyes are strained wry When she stands not in their sight, Believe not the heart turns from her, For nor prayers nor games nor violing Can move me from her a reed's-breadth.

The most beautiful pa.s.sages of Arnaut are in the canzo beginning:

Doutz brais e critz, Lais e cantars e voutas Aug dels auzels qu'en lor latins fant precs Quecs ab sa par, atressi c.u.m nos fam A las amigas en cui entendem; E doncas ieu qu'en la genssor entendi Dei far chansson sobre totz de bell' obra Que noi aia mot fais ni rima estrampa.

GLAMOUR AND INDIGO

Sweet cries and cracks and lays and chants inflected By auzels who, in their Latin belikes, Chirm each to each, even as you and I Pipe toward those girls on whom our thoughts attract; Are but more cause that I, whose overweening Search is toward the n.o.blest, set in cl.u.s.ter Lines where no word pulls wry, no rhyme breaks gauges.

No culs de sacs nor false ways me deflected When first I pierced her fort within its d.y.k.es, Hers, for whom my hungry insistency Pa.s.ses the gnaw whereby was Vivien wracked;[9]

Day-long I stretch, all times, like a bird preening, And yawn for her, who hath o'er others thrust her As high as true joy is o'er ire and rages.

Welcome not lax, and my words were protected Not blabbed to other, when I set my likes On her. Not bra.s.s but gold was 'neath the die.

That day we kissed, and after it she flacked O'er me her cloak of indigo, for screening Me from all culvertz' eyes, whose blathered bl.u.s.ter Can set such spites abroad; win jibes for wages.

G.o.d who did tax not Longus' sin,[10] respected That blind centurion beneath the spikes And him forgave, grant that we two shall lie Within one room, and seal therein our pact, Yes, that she kiss me in the half-light, leaning To me, and laugh and strip and stand forth in the l.u.s.tre Where lamp-light with light limb but half engages.

The flowers wax with buds but half perfected; Tremble on twig that shakes when the bird strikes-- But not more fresh than she! No empery, Though Rome and Palestine were one compact, Would lure me from her; and with hands convening I give me to her. But if kings could muster In homage similar, you'd count them sages.

Mouth, now what knacks!

What folly hath infected Thee? Gifts, that th' Emperor of the Salonikes Or Lord of Rome were greatly honored by, Or Syria's lord, thou dost from me distract; O fool I am! to hope for intervening?

From Love that shields not love! Yea, it were juster To call him mad, who 'gainst his joy engages.

POLITICAL POSTSCRIPT

The slimy jacks with adders' tongues bisected, I fear no whit, nor have; and if these tykes Have led Galicia's king to villeiny----[11]

His cousin in pilgrimage hath he attacked-- We know--Raimon the Count's son--my meaning Stands without screen. The royal filibuster Redeems not honor till he unbar the cages.

CODA

I should have seen it, but I was on such affair, Seeing the true king crown'd here in Estampa.[12]

Arnaut's tendency to lengthen the latter lines of the strophe after the diesis shows in: Er vei vermeils, vertz, blaus, blancs, gruocs, the strophe form being:

Vermeil, green, blue, peirs, white, cobalt, Close orchards, hewis, holts, hows, vales, And the bird-song that whirls and turns Morning and late with sweet accord, Bestir my heart to put my song in sheen T'equal that flower which hath such properties, It seeds in joy, bears love, and pain ameises.

The last cryptic allusion is to the quasi-allegorical descriptions of the tree of love in some long poem like the Romaunt of the Rose.

Dante takes the next poem as a model of canzo construction; and he learned much from its melody:

Sols sui qui sai lo sobrefan quern sortz Al cor d'amor sofren per sobramar, Car mos volers es tant ferms et entiers Cane no s'esduis de celliei ni s'estors Cui encubric al prim vezer e puois: Qu'ades ses lieis die a lieis cochos motz, Pois quan la vei non sai, tant l'ai, que dire.

We note the soft suave sound as against the staccato of "L'aura amara."

_Canzon._

I only, and who elrische pain support Know out love's heart o'er borne by overlove, For my desire that is so firm and straight And unchanged since I found her in my sight And unturned since she came within my glance, That far from her my speech springs up aflame; Near her comes not. So press the words to arrest it.

I am blind to others, and their retort I hear not. In her alone, I see, move, Wonder.... And jest not. And the words dilate Not truth; but mouth speaks not the heart outright: I could not walk roads, flats, dales, hills, by chance, To find charm's sum within one single frame As G.o.d hath set in her t'a.s.say and test it.

And I have pa.s.sed in many a goodly court To find in hers more charm than rumor thereof....

In solely hers. Measure and sense to mate, Youth and beauty learned in all delight, Gentrice did nurse her up, and so adyance Her fair beyond all reach of evil name, To clear her worth, no shadow hath oppresst it.

Her contact flats not out, falls not off short....

Let her, I pray, guess out the sense hereof For never will it stand in open prate Until my inner heart stand in daylight, So that heart pools him when her eyes entrance, As never doth the Rhone, fulled and untame, Pool, where the freshets tumult hurl to crest it.

Flimsy another's joy, false and distort, No paregale that she springs not above....

Her love-touch by none other mensurate.

To have it not? Alas! Though the pains bite Deep, torture is but galzeardy and dance, For in my thought my l.u.s.t hath touched his aim.

G.o.d! Shall I get no more! No fact to best it!

No delight I, from now, in dance or sport, Nor will these toys a tinkle of pleasure prove, Compared to her, whom no loud profligate Shall leak abroad how much she makes my right.