Volume Iv Part 14 (2/2)

TWO TRIOLETS

What he said:-- This kiss upon your fan I press-- Ah! Sainte Nitouche, you don't refuse it!

And may it from its soft recess-- This kiss upon your fan I press-- Be blown to you, a shy caress, By this white down, whene'er you use it.

This kiss upon your fan I press,-- Ah, Sainte Nitouche, you don't refuse it!

What she thought:-- To kiss a fan!

What a poky poet!

The stupid man To kiss a fan When he knows--that--he--can-- Or ought to know it-- To kiss a fan!

What a poky poet!

Harrison Robertson [1856-

THE BALLAD OF DEAD LADIES From The French Of Francois Villon 1450

Tell me now in what hidden way is Lady Flora the lovely Roman?

Where's Hipparchia, and where is Thais, Neither of them the fairer woman?

Where is Echo, beheld of no man, Only heard on river and mere,-- She whose beauty was more than human?...

But where are the snows of yester-year?

Where's Heloise, the learned nun, For whose sake Abeilard, I ween, Lost manhood and put priesthood on?

(From Love he won such dule and teen!) And where, I pray you, is the Queen Who willed that Buridan should steer Sewed in a sack's mouth down the Seine?...

But where are the snows of yester-year?

White Queen Blanche, like a queen of lilies, With a voice like any mermaiden,-- Bertha Broadfoot, Beatrice, Alice, And Ermengarde the lady of Maine,-- And that good Joan whom Englishmen At Rouen doomed and burned her there,-- Mother of G.o.d, where are they then?...

But where are the snows of yester-year?

Nay, never ask this week, fair lord, Where they are gone, nor yet this year, Except with this for an overword,-- But where are the snows of yester-year?

Dante Gabriel Rossetti [1828-1882]

BALLADE OF DEAD LADIES After Villon

Nay, tell me now in what strange air The Roman Flora dwells to-day, Where Archippiada hides, and where Beautiful Thais has pa.s.sed away?

Whence answers Echo, afield, astray, By mere or stream,--around, below?

Lovelier she than a woman of clay; Nay, but where is the last year's snow?

Where is wise Heloise, that care Brought on Abeilard, and dismay?

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