Par qui je sui einsi mas
Et mis de si haut si bas.
Et ne me poviés pas
Assaillir?

Las! miex amasse morir
Qu’avoir si grief souvenir
Qui moult souvent resjoïr
Me soloit,

M’amour en pensant doubloit,
Mon desir croistre faisoit,
Et toudis amenuisoit
Mes dolours;

Mais c’est dou tout a rebours,
Car croistre les fait tous jours
En grans soupirs et en plours,
Pour m’amour

Que scens par avoir valour,
Scens, courtoysie et honnour;
Or sçai bien que sans retour
Perdu l’ay

Et que la mort en aray,
Quant Amours delaisseray
Ne remirer ne porray
Son acueil,

Qui met en moy si grant dueil
Que riens ne desir ne vueil
Fors la mort. S’aray mon vueil
Acompli,

Et se il en estoit en my
De ma mort ou de merci,
Dou tout metroie en oubli
Ma vie,

Car en moy joie n’est mie;
Et on dit, je n’en doubt mie:
Qui bien aimme a tart oublie;
Bien l’ottroy;

Et pour ce qu’il ha l’ottroy
D’amours, soit sages de soy
Et si serve en bonne foy,
Sans folie,

Car il n’est, pour voir l’affie,
Nulle si grief departie,
Com c’est d’amy et d’amie.

motetus:
Fine Amour, qui me vint navrer
Au cuer, m’a fait grant desraison,
Quant elle ne voloit saner
Mon mal en temps et en saison;
Mais tant me fait en sa prison
Les tres griés peinnes endurer,
Car des or mais reconforter
Ne me puet, fors que nuire non,
Car Fortune ma garison
M’a tollu pour moy plus grever.
Helas! or me puis dementer,
Plourer et pleindre a grant foison,
En attendant, pour bien amer,
La mort en lieu de guerredon.

tenor:
Quare non sum mortuus?

Guillaume de Machaut (c1300-1377)

And this is why I feel so destroyed,
Thrown down so low from on so high,
And yet you could not manage
Turning on me?

Alas! I’d prefer dying
To entertaining such painful imagination
Which often used
To give me joy,

Which doubled the love I felt,
Made my desire increase,
And day after day decreased
My pains;

But now it’s just the opposite,
For now it makes them always increase,
With heavy sighs and weeping,
Because of my love

Which I feel possesses such virtue,
Good sense, courtliness and honour;
Now I know well I’ve lost it
Beyond recovery,

And that it shall be my death
When I shall quit Love
And can no longer gaze upon
Her fair welcome,

And this plunges me into such great misery
That I want or desire nothing
But death. If my wish
Will be granted,

And if it were up to me
About my dying or mercy
I would completely forget about
My life,

For there is no trace of joy in me;
And as they say, which I doubt not at all:
Whoever loves well forgets slowly;
I very much agree;

And as for him to whom love
Has been granted, let him be wise
And serve in good faith,
Without folly,

For there is, I confirm the truth of it,
No leave-taking so miserable
As that of a lover from his beloved.

motetus:
Pure Love, who came to pierce
My heart, did me a great injustice
In not wishing to cure my pains
At the proper time and season;
Instead in Her dungeon She forces me
To suffer its terribly grievous pains,
For from this point on She can offer
Me no comfort, only do me harm,
Since Fortune has snatched away
My cure, to grieve me still more deeply.
Alas! now I can go mad with grief,
Abandon myself to weeping and complaint,
As I expect, in return for loving well,
Death by way of reward.

tenor:
Why did I not die?

English: R Barton Palmer © 2018