by
Pierre de Ronsard (1524 - 1585)
Je meurs, Paschal, quand je la vois si...
Language: French (Français)
Our translations: ENG ENG
Je [meurs, Paschal]1, quand je la vois si belle
Le front si beau, et la bouche et les yeux,
Yeux le [logis]2 d'amour victorieux
Qui m'a blessé d'une flèche nouvelle.
Je n'ai ni sang, ni veine, ni moelle,
Qui ne se change : et me semble qu'aux cieux
Je suis ravi, assis entre les dieux,
Quand le bonheur me conduit auprès d'elle.
Ah ! que ne suis-je en ce monde un grand roi !
Elle serait [ma reine]3 auprès de moi :
Mais n'étant rien, il faut que je m'absente
De sa beauté, dont je n'ose approcher
Que d'un regard transformer je ne sente
Mes yeux en fleuve et mon cœur en rocher.
Available sung texts: (what is this?)
• A. Bertrand About the headline (FAQ)
View original text (without footnotes)
1 Bertrand: "meurs helas"
2 Bertrand: "sejour"
3 Bertrand: "toujours"
Text Authorship:
Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):
- by Anthoine de Bertrand (1540? - 1581?), "Je meurs helas, quand je la vois", first performed 1576 [ vocal quartet a cappella ], from 25 Chansons à 4 parties, Livre 3, no. 9 [sung text checked 1 time]
- by Anthoine de Bertrand (1540? - 1581?), "Je meurs, helas, quand je la voy si belle ", published 1578 [ vocal quartet a cappella ], from Les Amours de Pierre de Ronsard à 4 parties, Livre 2, no. 21 [sung text not yet checked]
- by Louis Théodore Gouvy (1819 - 1898), "Je meurs, hélas", op. 42 (Six Poésies de Ronsard) no. 1, published 1876 [ voice and piano ], from 40 Poèmes de Ronsard, no. 10, Paris, Éd Simon Richault [sung text not yet checked]
Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):
- ENG English (David Wyatt) , "I die, Paschal, when I see her looking so lovely", copyright © 2012, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
- ENG English (David Wyatt) , copyright © 2019, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [
Administrator]
This text was added to the website: 2010-10-28
Line count: 14
Word count: 109
I am dying, alas, I am dying, my angel
Language: English after the French (Français)
I am dying, alas, I am dying, my angel:
I’m dying for your beauty, I’m dying for true love,
I’m dying alas, I’m dying from cruel waiting,
Pierced fatally by a bitter arrow.
My mistress, my life, alas! alas, how I wish
That the golden sun would hasten my final day
Since I see quite well that returning, though soon,
Will not unloose my subject liberty.
My mistress, my life, oh have you no pity
At seeing me perishing for so chaste a love?
Will you leave me to die in this long-drawn pain?
See what it is to love too great a beauty,
Since as the prize for our loyalty
We gain only sickness and inhuman pain.
About the headline (FAQ)
Text Authorship:
- Translation from French (Français) to English copyright © 2019 by David Wyatt, (re)printed on this website with kind permission. To reprint and distribute this author's work for concert programs, CD booklets, etc., you may ask the copyright-holder(s) directly or ask us; we are authorized to grant permission on their behalf. Please provide the translator's name when contacting us.
Contact: licenses@email.lieder.example.net
Based on:
This text was added to the website: 2019-10-30
Line count: 14
Word count: 118