Je vis, je meurs: je me brule et me noye,
J’ay chaut estreme en endurant froidure:
La vie m'est et trop molle et trop dure.
J'ay grans ennuis entremeslez de joye: Tout à un coup je ris et je larmoye,
Et en plaisir maint grief tourment n'endure:
Mon bien s'en va, et à jamais il dure:
Tout en un coup je seiche et je verdoye. Ainsi Amour inconstamment me meine:
Et quand je pense avoir plus de douleur,
Sans y penser je me treuve hors de peine.Puis quand je croy ma joye estre certeine,
Et estre au haut de mon desiré heur,
Il me remet en mon premier malheur.
—Sonnet VIII by Louise Labbé (I found an English guide to the poem.)
The first time I heard Morcheeba's Au-delà, featuring Manda, the french fan who became a lead singer for a brief spell, I was at a Morcheeba concert in Denver, just before the album Dive Deep came out. When she started singing the lyrics, I started jumping up and down yelling "C'est Louise Labbé!" I guess half-hoping Manda could hear me. Yeah, wifey thought I'd gone mad. She would have thought so even more if she'd realized, as I did quickly, that the lyrics that started with Labbé quickly went its own way.
Je vis, je meurs; je ris, je pleure.Je vis de la mer; je vis de la terre.Je le dis aux fleurs; au lac de vapeur.Au ciel de toutes les couleurs,Ton soleil réchauffe mon cœur.Je vis, j'ai peur; je crie de douleurs.En secret je m'enterre: je cherche la chaleur.Je m'enfuis dans les airs; au delà de la terre.Au ciel de toutes les couleurs,Ton soleil réchauffe mon cœur.
—"Au-delà" by Morcheeba
I live, I die; I laugh, I cry.
I live of the sea; I live of the ground.
I say it to the flowers; to the lake of steam.In the all-colored sky,
Your sun warms my heart.I live, I die; I scream of pain.
I bury myself secretly: I am seeking heat.
I abscond into the air; beyond the earth.In the all-colored sky,
Your sun warms my heart.
—translation by Uche Ogbuji
BTW the last time I mentioned Morcheeba on Copia I was anticipating the new album after Skye Edwards had rejoined them. "Blood Like Lemonade" came out last year and is I think worth the wait. If you've been sleeping, wake up and check it out.
Labbé's sonnet famously brings Petrarca's style of antithetical tropes into French. Just this morning Au-delà came up in my shuffled playlist and I remembered I'd resolved to translate it, to see if I could preserve some of its music, which has eluded translations I've seen so far. Here is an excerpt from my attempt:
All at a stroke I laugh and I lament,
And suffer many torments in my pleasures:
They live forever, my absconding treasures:
All at a stroke I wither and augment.
—from "Je vis, je meurs" a translation of Sonnet VIII by Uche Ogbuji
re: lament/augment, you can either accept it as rime riche, or consider the "g" borrowed into its following syllable, as it does sound in my pronounciation.