from Troilus and Criseyde: Book I

f

(excerpt)

From Book I
And so bifel, whan comen was the tyme
Of Aperil, whan clothed is the mede
With newe grene, of lusty Veer the pryme,
And swote smellen floures white and rede,
In sondry wises shewed, as I rede,
The folk of Troie hir observaunces olde,
Palladiones feste for to holde.

And to the temple, in al hir beste wyse,
In general ther wente many a wight,
To herknen of Palladion the servyse;
And namely, so many a lusty knyght,
So many a lady fressh and mayden bright,
Ful wel arayed, both meste, mene, and leste,
Ye, bothe for the seson and the feste.

Among thise othere folk was Criseyda,
In widewes habit blak; but natheles,
Right as our firste lettre is now an A,
In beautee first so stood she, makeles;
Hire goodly lokyng gladed al the prees.
Nas nevere yet seyn thing to ben preysed derre,
Nor under cloude blak so bright a sterre

As was Criseyde, as folk seyde everichone
That hir bihelden in hir blake wede;
And yet she stood ful lowe and stille allone,
Byhynden other folk, in litel brede,
And neigh the dore, ay under shames drede,
Simple of atir and debonaire of chere,
With ful assured lokyng and manere.

This Troilus, as he was wont to gide
His yonge knyghtes, lad hem up and doun
In thilke large temple on every side,
Byholding ay the ladies of the town,
Now here, now there; for no devoc{.i}oun
Hadde he to non, to reven hym his reste,
But gan to preise and lakken whom hym leste.

And in his walk ful faste he gan to wayten
If knyght or squyer of his compaignie
Gan for to syke, or lete his eighen baiten
On any womman that he koude espye;
He wolde smyle, and holden it folye,
And seye him thus, "God woot, she slepeth softe
For love of the, whan thou turnest ful ofte!

"I have herd told, pardieux, of your lyvynge,
Ye loveres, and youre lewed observaunces,
And which a labour folk han in wynnynge
Of love, and in the kepyng which doutaunces;
And whan your preye is lost, woo and penaunces.
O veray fooles! nyce and blynde be ye!
Ther nys nat oon kan war by other be."

And with that word he gan cast up the browe,
Ascaunces, "Loo! is this naught wisely spoken?"
At which the god of love gan loken rowe
Right for despit, and shop for to ben wroken.
He kidde anoon his bowe nas naught broken;
For sodeynly he hitte him atte fulle;
And yet as proud a pekok kan he pulle!

O blynde world, O blynde entenc{.i}oun!
How often falleth al the effect contraire
Of surquidrie and foul presumpc{.i}oun;
For kaught is proud, and kaught is debonaire.
This Troilus is clomben on the staire,
And litel weneth that he moot descenden;
But al-day faileth thing that fooles wenden.

As proude Bayard gynneth for to skippe
Out of the wey, so pryketh hym his corn,
Til he a lasshe have of the longe whippe;
Than thynketh he, "Though I praunce al byforn
First in the trays, ful fat and newe shorn,
Yet am I but an hors, and horses lawe
I moot endure, and with my feres drawe."

424
Rating:

Comment form:

*Max text - 1500. Manual moderation.

Similar Poems:

My Voice Not Being Proud by Louise Bogan
Louise Bogan
My voice, not being proud
Like a strong woman’s, that cries
Imperiously aloud
That death disarm her, lull her—
Screams for no mourning color
Laid menacingly, like fire,
Over my long desire.
It will end, and leave no print.
Read Poem
0
426
Rating:

Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood by William Wordsworth
William Wordsworth
The child is father of the man;
And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.
(Wordsworth, "My Heart Leaps Up")
Read Poem
0
850
Rating:

In an Artist's Studio by Christina Rossetti
Christina Rossetti
One face looks out from all his canvases,
One selfsame figure sits or walks or leans:
We found her hidden just behind those screens,
That mirror gave back all her loveliness.
A queen in opal or in ruby dress,
A nameless girl in freshest summer-greens,
A saint, an angel — every canvas means
The same one meaning, neither more or less.
Read Poem
0
644
Rating:

Lines to Mr. Hodgson Written on Board the Lisbon Packet by Lord Byron (George Gordon)
Lord Byron (George Gordon)
Huzza! Hodgson, we are going,
Our embargo's off at last;
Favourable breezes blowing
Bend the canvass o'er the mast.
From aloft the signal's streaming,
Hark! the farewell gun is fir'd;
Women screeching, tars blaspheming,
Tell us that our time's expir'd.
Read Poem
0
489
Rating:

Israfel by Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe
And the angel Israfel, whose heart-strings are a lute, and who has the sweetest voice of all God’s creatures. —KORAN In Heaven a spirit doth dwell
“Whose heart-strings are a lute”;
Read Poem
0
484
Rating:

Encounter in Buffalo by Mary Barnard
Mary Barnard
The country lies flat, expressionless as the face of a stranger.
Not one hillock shelters a buried bone. The city:
a scene thin as a theater backdrop, where no doors open,
no streets extend beyond the view from the corner.

Only the railroad embankment is high, shaggy with grass.
Only the freight, knuckling a red sun under its wheels,
drags familiar box-car shapes down long perspectives
of childhood meals and all crossings at sunset.
Read Poem
0
400
Rating:

All in green went my love riding by E. E. Cummings
E. E. Cummings
All in green went my love riding
on a great horse of gold
into the silver dawn.

four lean hounds crouched low and smiling
the merry deer ran before.

Fleeter be they than dappled dreams
the swift sweet deer
the red rare deer.
Read Poem
0
530
Rating:

The Fountain by Charles Baudelaire
Charles Baudelaire
My dear, your eyes are weary;
Rest them a little while.
Assume the languid posture
Of pleasure mixed with guile.
Outside the talkative fountain
Continues night and day
Repeating my warm passion
In whatever it has to say.

The sheer luminous gown
The fountain wears
Where Phoebe’s very own
Color appears
Falls like a summer rain
Or shawl of tears.
Read Poem
2
907
Rating:

From where I stand by Pat Schneider
Pat Schneider
at the third floor window of the tenement,
the street looks shiny.
It has been washed and rinsed by rain.
Beyond the silver streaks of the streetcar tracks
a single streetlight stands
in a pool of wet light. It is night.
St. Louis. Nineteen forty-seven.
I have just come home from the orphanage
Read Poem
0
517
Rating:

Fable of the Ant and the Word by Mary Barnard
Mary Barnard
Ink-black, but moving independently
across the black and white parquet of print,
the ant cancels the author out. The page,
translated to itself, bears hair-like legs
disturbing the fine hairs of its fiber.
These are the feet of summer, pillaging meaning,
destroying Alexandria. Sunlight is silence
laying waste all languages, until, thinly,
Read Poem
0
421
Rating:

Fawn by Mary Barnard
Mary Barnard
Out of a high meadow where flowers
bloom above cloud, come down;
pursue me with reasons for smiling without malice.

Bring mimic pride like that of the seedling fir,
surprise in the perfect leg-stems
and queries unstirred by recognition or fear
pooled in the deep eyes.

Come down by regions where rocks
Read Poem
0
421
Rating:

In a Disused Graveyard by Robert Frost
Robert Frost
The living come with grassy tread
To read the gravestones on the hill;
The graveyard draws the living still,
But never any more the dead.

The verses in it say and say:
‘The ones who living come today
To read the stones and go away
Tomorrow dead will come to stay.’
Read Poem
0
533
Rating:

Playroom by Mary Barnard
Mary Barnard
Wheel of sorrow, centerless.
Voices, sad without cause,
slope upward, expiring on grave summits.
Mournfulness of muddy playgrounds,
raw smell of rubbers and wrapped lunches
when little girls stand in a circle singing
of windows and of lovers.

Hearing them, no one could tell
Read Poem
0
404
Rating:

Incidents of Travel in Poetry by Frank Lima
Frank Lima
Happy Birthday Kenneth Koch/Feb 27 We went to all those places where they restore sadness and joy
and call it art. We were piloted by Auden who became
Unbearably acrimonious when we dropped off Senghor into the
steamy skies of his beloved West Africa. The termites and ants
Read Poem
0
612
Rating:

Sonnet 125: Were’t aught to me I bore the canopy by William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare
Were’t aught to me I bore the canopy,
With my extern the outward honouring,
Or laid great bases for eternity,
Which proves more short than waste or ruining;
Have I not seen dwellers on form and favour
Lose all, and more, by paying too much rent,
For compound sweet forgoing simple savour,
Pitiful thrivers, in their gazing spent?
Read Poem
0
438
Rating:

Bound for Hell by Marina Tsvetaeva
Marina Tsvetaeva
Hell, my ardent sisters, be assured,
Is where we’re bound; we’ll drink the pitch of hell—
We, who have sung the praises of the lord
With every fiber in us, every cell.

We, who did not manage to devote
Our nights to spinning, did not bend and sway
Above a cradle—in a flimsy boat,
Wrapped in a mantle, we’re now borne away.
Read Poem
0
553
Rating:

The Haunted Palace by Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe
In the greenest of our valleys
By good angels tenanted,
Once a fair and stately palace—
Radiant palace—reared its head.
In the monarch Thought’s dominion,
It stood there!
Never seraph spread a pinion
Over fabric half so fair!
Read Poem
0
480
Rating:

The Western Emigrant by Lydia Huntley Sigourney
Lydia Huntley Sigourney
An axe rang sharply ’mid those forest shades
Which from creation toward the skies had tower’d
In unshorn beauty. There, with vigorous arm
Wrought a bold emigrant, and by his side
His little son, with question and response,
Beguiled the toil.
‘Boy, thou hast never seen
Such glorious trees. Hark, when their giant trunks
Fall, how the firm earth groans. Rememberest thou
The mighty river, on whose breast we sail’d,
So many days, on toward the setting sun?
Our own Connecticut, compar’d to that,
Was but a creeping stream.’
‘Father, the brook
That by our door went singing, where I launch’d
Read Poem
0
561
Rating:

"How can I keep my maidenhead" by Robert Burns
Robert Burns
How can I keep my maidenhead,
My maidenhead, my maidenhead;
How can I keep my maidenhead,
Among sae mony men, O.

The Captain bad a guinea for’t,
A guinea for’t, a guinea for’t,
The Captain bad a guinea for’t,
The Colonel he bad ten, O.

But I’ll do as my minnie did,
My minnie did, my minnie did,
But I’ll do as my minnie did,
For siller I’ll hae nane, O.

Read Poem
0
523
Rating:

from Hero and Leander: "It lies not in our power to love or hate" by Christopher Marlowe
Christopher Marlowe
It lies not in our power to love or hate,
For will in us is overruled by fate.
When two are stripped, long ere the course begin,
We wish that one should lose, the other win;
And one especially do we affect
Of two gold ingots, like in each respect:
The reason no man knows; let it suffice
What we behold is censured by our eyes.
Where both deliberate, the love is slight:
Who ever loved, that loved not at first sight?
Read Poem
0
577
Rating: