[Henry Quince]

Roger, that thread was on the Translation board, wasn’t it. The last post to the thread must have been less than a year ago, and it’s possible to see at least one thread older than that, but that one seems to have gone. As I recall, it was Clive Watkins’s thread and his translation appeared at the top.

I don’t have a full copy of the thread, but I just found a file with copies of some (probably not all) of the d’Orleans translations. This was mine:


The year has shed his winter wear
of wind, of freezings and of rain,
and donned his finery again —
the radiant sunshine, clear and fair.

No beast nor bird but now will share,
each in its voice, in this refrain:
“The year has shed his winter wear
of wind, of freezings and of rain.”

Rivers and streamlets glint and flare
with many a silver droplet train
and many a liquid lacework chain:
all’s dressed anew in the fresh spring air.
The year has shed his winter wear.


Roger, say if you’d like me to post others here or PM them to you.

Henry

PS Edited to add that I only have the one Slater version, which appears to be the one posted above. Btw there’s a typo there in wond(e)rous.




[This message has been edited by Henry Quince (edited February 01, 2005).]

[Esther Cameron]

I was glad to see Hardy's "The Roman Road." Here is my favorite rondeau, by W.H. Auden:

THE HIDDEN LAW

The Hidden Law does not deny
Our laws of probability,
But takes the atom and the star
And human beings as they are,
And answers nothing when we lie.

It is the only reason why
No government can codify,
And verbal definitions mar
The Hidden Law.

Its utter patience will not try
To stop us if we want to die:
When we escape It in a car,
When we forget It in a bar,
These are the ways we're punished by
The Hidden Law.

[Janet Kenny]

Esther,
Thanks for that classic Auden warning.
Janet

[Lo]

I just found this thread and I am finding it most interesting because I've been playing with the form myself, lately. There seems to be some dissention about the wisdom of posting our own examples and I'm about half&half leaning to either side. I'd certainly never profess to being a "master" at anything, and yet, how better to get a specific and little used form recognized and discussed as a specific form if not by comparing it to those who ARE masters?

That being said, I am posting it anyhow.


Someday I'll Leave

Forgive me, Love, for words unsaid -
for letters written, never read -
for poems I write and then erase-
for all the walls I keep in place -
for barriers I build in dread.

Some fantasies are best unfed,
some truths are tales that liars spread.
Some day I'll leave without a trace.
Forgive me, Love.

For dragons underneath my bed -
for demons writhing in my head -
for all my strange and misplaced grace,
for every tear that streaks my face -
for all the fears I'll never shed -
Forgive me, Love.

[Roger Slater]

I'm just posting to renew my request to anyone who has the complete d'Orleans thread. I kept a copy of the first half, but not the rest, and I'm almost sure that I posted a sort of funny takeoff version to the end of the thread. I've searched both my computers and can't find a trace of it. Alas, it is probably gone, and so I can let myself imagine that it was quite wonderful...until someone finds it and I go, "Oh yeah, that."