Poetry? Poetry!
Apr. 5th, 2007 11:09 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
olorielI had wanted to ask what had happened to (Inter-)National Poetry Month yesterday, but by that time half my flist had already beaten me to it, which was just as well as I really had no time.
But, at any rate, April was Poetry Month last year, and some people posted a poem every day and some posted one every week and some just posted one when they found one and had the time - at any rate, there was poetry. And it was good.
So I think this month I'll jump in on the poetry-slamming and try to post a poem every day - or every few days at least. Some will be in English, some will be in German, some, like today's, will be kind of in-between. If I find the time and the fancy tickles me, I may translate them (the German ones to English, anyway; I'm afraid I'm expecting of my German friends that their English suffices for passive poetry-reading); if I don't, I shan't.
Aaaanyway, here's today's poem! As it's always easiest to start with something that has to do with the season, it's the general prologue from Chaucer's Canterbury tales. ("The Waste Land" would have been the other obvious choice, and in fact it'll probably follow one of these days, as its claims are so wonderfully different from those of this one.) It's Middle English, but already well on its way to Early Modern English and thus at least vaguely understandable, so I won't bother with a translation (unless you absolutely want one).
Spelling and wording is according to The Riverside Chaucer.
Whan that Aprill with his shoures soote
The droghte of March hath perced to the roote,
And bathed every veyne in swich licour
Of which vertu engendred is the flour;
Whan Zephirus eek with his sweete breeth
Inspired hath in every holt and heath
The tender croppes, and the yonge sonne
Hath in the Ram his half cours yronne,
And smale foweles maken melodye,
That slepen al the nyght with open ye
(So priketh hem nature in hir corages),
Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages,
And palmers for to seken straunge strondes,
To ferne halwes, kowthe in sondry londes;
And specially from every shires ende
Of Engelond to Caunterbury they wende,
The hooly blissful martir for to seke,
That hem hath holpen whan that they were seeke.
Bifil that in that seson on a day,
In Southwark at the Tabard as I lay
Redy to wenden on my pilgrimage
To Caunterbury with ful devout courage,
At nyght was come into that hostelrye
Wel nyne and twenty in a compaignye
Of sondry folk, by aventure yfalle
In felaweshipe, and pilgrims were they alle,
That toward Caunterbury wolden ryde.
The chambers and the stables weren wyde,
And wel we weren esed ate beste.
And shortly, whan the sonne was to reste,
So hadde I spoken with hem everichon
That I was of hir felaweshipe anon,
And made forward erly for to ryse,
To make oure wey ther as I yow devyse.
- it goes on to describe each of the pilgrims at great length and with a lot of wit and irony; but I am waaaaay to lazy to copy all that down, and at any rate it would rather go beyond the scope of one LJ entry. I do recommend reading it, and the rest of the tales, though; most of them are hilarious, those that are bad are hilarious in the way they parody the ones who tell them, and the rivalries between the different parties are just wonderful.
So there.
But, at any rate, April was Poetry Month last year, and some people posted a poem every day and some posted one every week and some just posted one when they found one and had the time - at any rate, there was poetry. And it was good.
So I think this month I'll jump in on the poetry-slamming and try to post a poem every day - or every few days at least. Some will be in English, some will be in German, some, like today's, will be kind of in-between. If I find the time and the fancy tickles me, I may translate them (the German ones to English, anyway; I'm afraid I'm expecting of my German friends that their English suffices for passive poetry-reading); if I don't, I shan't.
Aaaanyway, here's today's poem! As it's always easiest to start with something that has to do with the season, it's the general prologue from Chaucer's Canterbury tales. ("The Waste Land" would have been the other obvious choice, and in fact it'll probably follow one of these days, as its claims are so wonderfully different from those of this one.) It's Middle English, but already well on its way to Early Modern English and thus at least vaguely understandable, so I won't bother with a translation (unless you absolutely want one).
Spelling and wording is according to The Riverside Chaucer.
Whan that Aprill with his shoures soote
The droghte of March hath perced to the roote,
And bathed every veyne in swich licour
Of which vertu engendred is the flour;
Whan Zephirus eek with his sweete breeth
Inspired hath in every holt and heath
The tender croppes, and the yonge sonne
Hath in the Ram his half cours yronne,
And smale foweles maken melodye,
That slepen al the nyght with open ye
(So priketh hem nature in hir corages),
Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages,
And palmers for to seken straunge strondes,
To ferne halwes, kowthe in sondry londes;
And specially from every shires ende
Of Engelond to Caunterbury they wende,
The hooly blissful martir for to seke,
That hem hath holpen whan that they were seeke.
Bifil that in that seson on a day,
In Southwark at the Tabard as I lay
Redy to wenden on my pilgrimage
To Caunterbury with ful devout courage,
At nyght was come into that hostelrye
Wel nyne and twenty in a compaignye
Of sondry folk, by aventure yfalle
In felaweshipe, and pilgrims were they alle,
That toward Caunterbury wolden ryde.
The chambers and the stables weren wyde,
And wel we weren esed ate beste.
And shortly, whan the sonne was to reste,
So hadde I spoken with hem everichon
That I was of hir felaweshipe anon,
And made forward erly for to ryse,
To make oure wey ther as I yow devyse.
- it goes on to describe each of the pilgrims at great length and with a lot of wit and irony; but I am waaaaay to lazy to copy all that down, and at any rate it would rather go beyond the scope of one LJ entry. I do recommend reading it, and the rest of the tales, though; most of them are hilarious, those that are bad are hilarious in the way they parody the ones who tell them, and the rivalries between the different parties are just wonderful.
So there.
