Overview
Medium: Poem (Ballad, based on extant example)
Written: May 2025
Inspiration: Based upon ballad by Christine de Pisan (France/Italy, 1364-1431)
First Performed: Midrealm Crown Tourney, Spring 2025 (May 24, 2025)
Ha, the gentlest that there ever was made!
The pleasantest that many ever knew!
Most perfect to receive a high acclaim!
This duke, a Stag, rampant and blue.
Oh sovereigns, Cellach now approach to you.
His champion’s love on earth, her paradise,
Her that he love, his sweetest desire.
And the most perfect joy of our own eyes!
His good in all, greatness does it inspire.
To sit the throne would be our delight.
His many accolades, among those:
Peers of Duke, Laurel, and Knight.
To these honors, shall he add a rose?
The winner yet to come, God only knows.
So greet this bringer of great joy and mirth.
From far and wide the gathered do admire,
This noblest’ of men to find upon this earth.
His good in all, greatness does it inspire.
Notes
This poem was written for the Crown Tourney Praise Poetry Project in the spring of 2025. It was written for the consort Duke Cellach MacCormaic.
Care was taken to follow the same rhyme scheme as the original ballad (ABABB CDCD, with the last line repeated at the end of every stanza). Several lines of the poem, including the repeated line, were taken directly form the original ballad, modified slightly to fit the theme and setting but keeping the same imagery.
Research & Resources
The exact name of the source piece is unknown. The piece this particular poem was based upon was found on two different sources titled “Ballad II” and “Ballad XVIII”, but it does not appear to be from her famous work The Hundred Ballads. I believe this particular poem was a standalone piece, but annot confirm that.
The source may be found HERE.
English Text
Ha, the gentlest that there ever was made!
The pleasantest that any woman knew!
Most perfect to receive a high acclaim!
The best beloved of any woman too!
Of my true heart ever the sweetest food!
My only love on earth, my paradise,
All that I love, my sweetest desire,
And the most perfect joy of my eyes!
Your sweetness in me fierce war does inspire.
Your sweetness has truly forced its way
Into a heart, that never thought to rue
Such a state, yet has been so inflamed,
By ardent desire, life would leave it too,
If Sweet Thought did not comfort it anew:
But Memory comes to lie with it, and I
Hold and embrace you in my thought the while,
Yet when your sweet kisses are denied,
Your sweetness in me fierce war does inspire.
My sweet love, loved with all my heart, I say,
The thought does not exist that could remove
That sweet glance from my heart, that your gaze
Enclosed within it: Nothing could so do –
Nor your voice, nor gentle touch of those two
Dear hands, that barely causing me to sigh,
Wish everywhere to search and to enquire:
Yet when I cannot see you with my eyes,
Your sweetness in me fierce war does inspire.
Fairest and best to capture my heart, I
Pray you, remember me: this I require,
For when I cannot see you as I desire
Your sweetness in me fierce war does inspire.
Angist Arts 