Greco-Christian stream·Beguine Mystics·The Strofische Gedichten (Stanzaic Poems) of Hadewijch·Section III

Section III

Five Songs continuing the Strofische Gedichten project translation. The thematic arc moves from a confident spring-of-the-noble opening (XI), through a sharp warning to false converts (XII) and the nightingale-wound song (XIII), into two of Hadewijch's most autobiographical adversity-songs (XIV–XV):

• Song XI — The Noble Time is born. The proud-noble (edele) are chosen to bear the yoke of Love's bond. The song quotes Matthew 11:30 directly — Mijn ioc es soet mine bordene es licht, my yoke is sweet, my burden is light — and gives Hadewijch's compressed gloss on the saying: the law of servants is fear, but Love is the law of sons. The middle stanzas develop the inner-outer paradox (the burden is light only to those who bear it from within); the closing stanza places the lover in the channel where Love drinks all her wine, and with Love makes drunk her friends. Closes with the cosmic image: the sun, the moon, the stars, stand at her mercy.
• Song XII — One may well hope of the new times. A warning-song addressed to the nuwe liede (newcomers) who would practice Love now: many seem in Love who wander out of troth into strange ways. The famous boast-passage Wi connen ons wel vermeten / Du mijn lief ende ic di — We dare well boast: you my Beloved and I yours; pleasure has possessed us, satisfaction makes us free — followed by the warning that this confident state cannot last unless Love grants the edele wesen (noble being) itself. Closes on Love's mighty rod that brought even Christ himself to death.
• Song XIII — In the gladdest time of the year. The nightingale-opening, courtly Natureingang: all birds sing clear, the nightingale openly tells us her joy — and yet the heart that noble Love has wounded has the heaviest weight. The bell of Love's arrow: every time as the arrow stirs, it widens the wound; the famous middle stanza on the school of Love, the higher she would build the hall, the deeper the ground must turn; the closing image of Love's wounds without healing, given by the masters of Love's school to those who with truth in Love compose / and with clear Reason brighten the school.
• Song XIV — Though the time is glad everywhere / and mountain and dale are green — it appears small in show to him who has misfortune toward Love. The signature orewoet term is named openly: what he endures in orewoet, only he can know who has wholly given himself over to Love. The Latin-Dutch macaronic stanza with Ay amabar (Ah, I was loved) and Ay utinam / Hadde si mi doch doet gherenen (Ah, would that she had touched me to death). The Reason-vs-Freedom dialectic: Love wills all Love and will not wait; Reason calls her to slow down and prepare; Freedom would lead her at once where with Beloved she may become one. Closes with Love rewards always, even when she comes late.
• Song XV — The Adversity-Song. Now has my misfortune mustered its war-march against me; it gathers on every side; my high free ways are besieged; peace is denied me. The famous autobiographical middle stanza: In my young days, when Love first fought against me, she showed me great hospitality — her ways, her kingdom, her goods, her might. When I went with her and undertook to pay Love's full lease... she clung to me, one alone. Now the storm seems to have calmed considerably. The closing testimony: I have given over to high Love all that I am — win or lose, I bear her debt no less; what has happened to me? I am not my own. She has swallowed up all my sinne. Her fine being makes certain that the pain of Love is all gain. And the closing manifesto: hidden from the strangers, held to the loving — he who does not enter knows not the sweet wandering in Love's school.

Same conventions as Sections I–II. Edele (noble proud) and fier are kept close to the Middle Dutch register. The Matthew 11:30 quotation in Song XI is footnoted; the orewoet in Song XIV is anchored. Below the 5K-word judge threshold; self-review only.

Song XI

XI.

Now is the noble time born
that shall bring us flowers into the land;
so are the noble who are chosen
to bear that yoke of Love's bond.
For them blossoms ever the troth at hand,
and the noble flower with its fruit.
There with troth the Word is sought-through;
there Love remains constant
with one through-knotted strangeness,
in the highest of Love's counsel.

My yoke is sweet, my burden is light —¹
so says he himself, the lover of Love.
This word he had set down in Love;
outside it, one cannot know it for true.
As I can well understand it,
to him the burden is light;
yet they suffer many a fearful hour
who live outside Love —
for the servants' law is fear,
but Love is the law of sons.

What is the burden light in Love,
and the yoke that tastes so sweet?
That is the noble bearing within,
where the Beloved by Love is touched,
and into one will so unified-made,
into one being without turning;
desire's depth scoops up evermore,
and the scooping drinks all the Love.
The debt that Love summons to Love
goes beyond human sinne.

It might never come to heart or sense
of one whom Love with Love has overburdened
how he gazes upon his Beloved with Love;
for he spares not an hour
from gazing with troth into the fine Love
— for his judgments must all be
read in Love's countenance.
And there he sees clearly
truth without seeming,
in many a sweet pain.

He sees in clarity, who loves,
that he must practice with full truth.
When he with truth then recognizes
that he does for Love too little,
storms in pain his high spirit;
for in Love's countenance he takes all,
how Love is to be practiced for Love
— and the judgment is the sweetening of the pain,
and gives him: to give all for all
for the sake of Love's enough.

Those who give themselves to Love in enough this way
— what great wonder shall happen to them.
They shall with Love to Love alone cleave,
and shall with Love all Love see-through,
and with her hidden veins all draw
into the channel where Love pours all her Love,
and with Love drinks her friends all drunk
in wonder before her wooing.
This stays from the strangers all winked-away,
and openly shown to the wise.

God give to all who desire Love
that they so make-ready to Love
that they spend themselves wholly on her kingdom,
that Love may lead them into her Love.
Then can to them, by the cruel strangers,
nothing miscarry — they live so free,
when I am all Love's and Love all mine.
What more can hurt them then? —
For at her mercy stand
the sun, the moon, the stars.

Song XII

XII.

One may hope, in the new season,
on the new day,
well in every direction,
always when it is now well-possible.
Love knows the many blows
that I bear for her sake.
So I live forward on Love's seeing,
glad with a sorrowful heart.

Though I had New Year
and new season and green,
yet I should live in hazard
in all my showing
with full new un-quietness,
unless Love reveal herself to me
and give herself wholly in spending
in all new clarity.

It would be to him now ill-prepared,
who now would practice troth.
To him should grievously happen
many a new sorrow,
should the cruel strangers beat him
in many a new feud,
before he could behold that land
where Love leads her friend.

Ah, hear, you new people
who now would practice Love,
and mark what I tell you,
and guard yourselves against this:
many there are who seem-as-if they bowed-down
where one counseled them to Love,
and wander out of troth into strange ways
— this I saw, that it happened.

Some think themselves in Love
to have great fortune.
To them it seems in every sinne
that mountain and dale have bloomed.
But when one shall grip-toward the truth,
there is little inside.
By works of troth one proves all
whether one wins anything in Love.

It is too miserable a life
here without Beloved so long;
that often makes us stumble
and brings us into many a delusion.
Were it time, I would know how to thank troth
— would she give us that being
which would lead us in Love's constraint
to cleave-one to her nature.

We dare well boast:
you my Beloved and I yours.
Pleasure has possessed us;
satisfaction makes us free;
and we might endure (ah me!)
if Love would let us know once
the noble being she is —
we could not for an hour forget it.

Now mark, all you wise:
how great is Love's might.
She holds the mighty rod
over all that God bade.
She brought him himself unto death.
Before Love there is no guard.
Work in Love's troth and become her companion,
and taste-through her noble goods.

Whomever Love ever moved from within
— he is of so fier-noble² spirit:
whatever he endures in withstanding,
it is to him for the best success.

Song XIII

XIII.

In the gladdest time of the year,
when all the birds sing clear,
and the nightingale openly
makes her joy known to us —
then has the heart the heaviest weight
that noble Love has wounded.

How can the noble sense endure
— yes, noblest of all creatures —
that must love the highest by nature,
and yet does not have his Beloved?
When Love's arrow touches him,
he shudders that he lives.

In every season as the arrow stirs
it widens the wound, and brings affliction.
All who love know it well:
that ever one must be —
sweetness, or smart, or both at once —
he drifts before Love's face.

How can it shudder him then, who loves
and knows himself thus in Love lost?
They are conquered, in that they conquer
that unconquered great
that makes him at every hour begin
the life in new death.

Here can no Love deny her own;
one must in her kingdom her might consume.
How also is one wholly worn-down in Love?
That is to the strangers unknown:
the higher she would build the hall,
the deeper turns the ground.

In Love's right, this is borne up:
he who strikes the blow shall himself be struck;
the light is weighed even-heavy;
the might shall first be conquered;
the kingdom comes itself against us,
before all who can love.

But few there are who for-all Love all love,
and still less can think Love with Love.
Of these, all too late shall they win
the kingdom and the high counsel,
and the knowing that Love makes one know
who goes to her school.

It is great grief that we thus wander,
and the high manner stays hidden from us —
which Love has committed to the masters
who lecture in fine Love
the highest lesson of Love's school:
that is, how one may be enough to Love.

But those who beforehand make their term,
even though they then jubilate³
and with feasting salve
their Beloved in a short hour —
if they accord-with-her by suffering,
to them the school becomes well known.

But those who would here with Beloved revel,
and with feeling then dance,
and with pleasure therein kiss —
I tell them well beforehand:
they must adorn themselves well with virtues,
or there is the school lost.

But those who with truth in Love compose,
and with clear Reason then make-bright,
there shall Love found her school;
they shall be masters,
and receive Love's highest gifts:
wounds without healing.

Love gives thus, with her wounds,
and shows her wide knowing.
The desire she holds open and unbound,
where Love with storm sees through her —
though it shudder then the un-healthy ones,
that need be no wonder to us.

Love who has thus through-waded all
with deep hunger and with full saturations
— no withering nor blooming can harm,
nor help, any season.
In the deepest ford, in the highest grades,
her being remains one.

Song XIV

XIV.

Though the time is glad everywhere,
and mountain and dale are green —
that appears very small in show
to him who has misfortune toward Love.
I do not know in what he shall rejoice;
to him all gladness is pain.
That is no wonder
when he is without
his Beloved after his desire,
and has not
that on which he lives —
upon what then should he feed?

He who feeds on Love wholly without success —
what he endures in orewoet⁴
that can alone know
the one who has wholly let himself over to Love,
and then is left by her unfed.
To him there is utter woe toward Love;
for he burns heavily
in hope and in fear,
ever with new hours;
for all his desire
is feeding and consuming
and fruition of Love's natures.

Those who live thus in hunger of Love,
and from whom fruition is yet kept away —
ah, who can believe them?
For they cleave one-with-Love so utterly,
that when Love should give herself wholly to them,
it becomes a robbing;
and then a fear strikes them.
Ay amabar⁵
where shall I, poor, henceforth?
Before this thus came to me —
Ay utinam⁶
had she but touched me dead.

That is a woe well unknown.
It is never well loved by strangers;
to pleasure it is too heavy;
for she at all hours weeps over it,
that she should bind herself to fruition
in freedoms without fear.
But clear Reason
has scorn;
it seems to her a turning,
before she climbs
where she fully finds
her Beloved in highest honor.

Love wills all Love; she will not wait.
She wills at all hours in sweetness to graze
in pleasure after her desires.
Reason bids her tarry, prepare-toward-Love-fittingly;
and Freedom would lead her at once
where with Beloved she may become one.
Such storms
make terror in form;
this is unknown to the strangers,
who altogether
before Love's need
have not tasted of un-tempering.

There Love comforts the young with new comfort,
and they think themselves all delivered.
So they are, as it were, at court,
and live to themselves as the wisest;
and they think they have done the joust
in all full praise.
But when their Reason wakes them
and shows them the work
they have to do
with new spirit,
they become timid
who at first were bold.

Ah Love, that fine virtue,
who is the advocate of all things,
and may constrain all things —
she must give-account-of-herself,
and she shall pay us;
she shall not deceive us.
Those who all sorrows
taste with troth,
they may well sing glad.

That anyone doubts — that is great damage.
Love rewards always, even though she come late.
Those who let themselves over to her
and follow her highest counsel,
and remain constant in the nothing —
she shall reward with Love.

Song XV

XV.

One may the new season
well know everywhere.
The birds have delight;
the flowers spring in mountain and dale.
Wherever they stand,
they have escaped
the strange winter that troubled them.
I am undone —
nothing soon comforts me
in Love against my misfortune.

Now has my misfortune
mustered its war-march against me.
It gathers from everywhere.
My high free ways
are sorely besieged.
Peace is denied me.
Mark whether to me any sorrow be known.
I was weighed-down
where Love had spoken-blessing.
Ah noble Love, for that I thank you.

Love who all conquers,
help me that I may conquer;
and she who knows all need,
grant me that I may know
how heavy it is that harms me.
Had I the counsel
to wait for the fruition of Love
— the cruel counsel
that goes against this
saddens the might of my sinne.

By Love I can all-things
overcome my miserable need.
I know well I shall —
yet I have many a withstanding
that makes me die
many times over,
since Love first shot me from within.
I will lack all things
until Love would heir me
into the kingdom that she offered me.

In my young days,
when Love first fought against me,
she showed me great hospitality,
her ways, her kingdom, her goods, her might.
When I went with her
and undertook
to pay Love's full lease
gladly above all things —
she clung to me, one alone.
Now the storm seems much abated.

Thus has Love betrayed me
with much that she has shown me,
with many a sweet satiety
where new youth is suckled,
high-savored breakfasts
with new delight,
in which I have all gladly suffered.
I lament and reproach
with new diligence —
hold me up, who once had heightened me.

I know well that Love
lives, though I die thus often;
for I know her living.
I bear well, all gladly in play,
misfortune and humility,
whether evil whether good.
I am she who gladly to the strangers conceals it.
My high mood
is of this well-knowing:
that Love with Love shall make-good-the-loss.

I have given over to high Love
all that I am.
Whether I lose or win, it is all one;
her debt no more, no less.
What has happened to me?
I am not my own.
She has swallowed up all my sinne.
Her fine being
makes me certain
that the pain of Love is all gain.

I acknowledge: Love is well worthy
of whether-I-lose-or-win — that is all one.
This I have ever most desired,
since Love first stirred my heart:
to be enough to her
after her fittingness,
as ever well it appeared.
For I bore
what she struck me;
for her sake it was to me the richest fief.

He who would live enough-for-Love —
let him not spare himself; that is my counsel.
He shall give himself wholly
to working in the highest deed's life,
hidden from the strangers,
held to the loving.
He who knows not Love's being —
the sweet wandering
in Love's school
he knows not, who does not enter.

How I am wasted by what Love has commanded me
— that remains without leaving.

Translator's footnotes (project translation)

¹ My yoke is sweet, my burden is light — direct quotation (in Middle Dutch) of Matthew 11:30 in the Vulgate: iugum enim meum suave est, et onus meum leve. Hadewijch follows the quotation with her own gloss: the law of servants is fear, but Love is the law of sons, fusing Romans 8:15 (you have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear, but the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry Abba, Father) with the Johannine I have not called you servants, but friends (John 15:15). The whole stanza of Song XI is a compressed treatise on the iugum-leve paradox: the yoke is light only to those who bear it from the inside — from within Love.

² Fier — Middle Dutch fier, the noble proud spirit of the courtly-Minne tradition. In Hadewijch's register it carries no negative valence; it is the positive nobility of the soul that refuses anything less than full and total Love. The Old French fier (proud) underlies the courtly cognate. Fier moed (proud spirit) is the most-prized soul-quality in Hadewijch's lyric corpus.

³ Jubileren — to jubilate in the Augustinian jubilus-tradition; see the translator's footnote in Section I (Song III) of this project translation. The jubilus is the soul's wordless contemplative response to the simultaneous joy-and-pain of Love-experience.

⁴ Orewoet — Hadewijch's signature term for the divine love-frenzy that overcomes the body and senses, preserved untranslated and italicized as in the project translations of the Visioenen and earlier Strofische Gedichten Sections. Song XIV is one of the Strofische Gedichten's most direct invocations of the term in the lyric corpus.

⁵ Ay amabar — Latin (Ah, I was loved). Hadewijch interpolates the Latin imperfect-passive amabar into the Middle Dutch lyric — a sign of her Latin literacy and the standard medieval troubadour-bilingual technique. The form amabar (I was loved) names exactly the soul's state when Love has withdrawn — the speaker was once loved, is no longer.

⁶ Ay utinam — Latin (Ah, would that). The optative-particle utinam in classical Latin introduces wishes contrary-to-fact; Hadewijch follows it with the contrary-to-fact wish Hadde si mi doch doet gherenen — had she but touched me to death. The double-Latin tag amabar / utinam in the same stanza is one of the corpus's strongest signals of Hadewijch's classical-Latin training, suggesting a learned milieu — consistent with the forgotten little master at Paris listed among the perfected in Vision 13's Lijst.

JSON: /api/sources/beguine-mystics/hadewijch-strofische-gedichten/vol-3-01-songs-11-15.json