A La Royne Catherine de Medicis  

by Pierre de Ronsard

. . . L’autre jour que j’etois au temple à Sainct Denis,

Regardant tant de Rois en leurs cachottes mis,

Que n’agueres faisaient trembler toute la France,

Qui tous enflex d’orgueil, de pompe et d’esperance

Menoient un camp armé, tuoient et commandoient,

Et de leur peuple avoient les biens qu’ils demandoient,

Et les voyant couchez, n’ayans plus que l’escorce,

Comme buches de bois sans puissance ny force,

            Je disois à par moy:  Ce n’est rien que des Rois:

D’un nombre que voicy, à peine ou deux ou trois

Vivent apres leur mort, pour n’avoir este chiches

Vers les bons escrivains et les avoir fait riches. . .

To Queen Catherine de Medici  

by Pierre de Ronsard

. . . The other day, when I’d stepped inside

the church of Saint Denis and saw them, side by side

 

in their shallow niches, so many great

rulers lying in state

 

in stone, each inside a jail of death,

though everyone in France took a startled breath,

 

sometime, at the sight of his flying

colors—each leading out his armed camp, trying

 

for glory, and always receiving more

goods and help from his people than he’d asked for—

 

seeing them lying there, my lady,

on their backs, finally

 

unescorted, unhorsed,

with no more authority or force

 

than pale, stripped branches,

just rows and rows of impotence,

 

I said to myself, “There’s nothing

in here but Kings,

 

and quite a few of them.  No more than three

or two live on in anyone’s memory,

 

and only because it did not occur

—not to these monarchs—not to be meager

 

toward their writers, but rather make much

of them—even make them rich.”

translated from French by Diane Furtney
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