Poets’ Corner- The Mad Hatter 15^th Century France’s Francois Villon Whether They Claim Him Or Not

 

 

From The Pen Of Frank Jackman

Once a long time ago an old communist I do not remember which version of the creed he adhered to, although he had had some impressive documented revolutionary credentials in Germany before Hitler pulled the hammer down in 1933 and he just barely got out into American exile by a very long and circuitous route, told me that as far as culture affairs, you know art, novels, music and what I want to talk about here, poetry, is basically subject to whatever personal whims a person may have on these matters. The caveat to all this is that both creators and admirers should be left to their own devises except if they are actively engaged with counter-revolutionary activity. Now that I think about it he probably got the idea from Leon Trotsky himself who wrote about such matters in the 1920s in books like  Literature and Revolution although I am sure that he did not consider himself a follower of that great revolutionary who was exiled in the late 1920s.

The point today is that if a left-wing political activist like myself, say, were very interested in the poetry of Emily Dickerson or Wallace Stevens or Thomas Mann or Edna Saint Vincent Millay then what of it. Except those kinds of poets do not “speak” to me. Poets like Allan Ginsberg burning the pages with his negro streets, his clamoring against the industrial complex, his angel hipsters, his chanting against the fate of the best minds of his generation, the gangster-poet Gregory Corso blazing the hot streets with his words and taking no prisoners, old Rimbaud with his mad ravings, Verlaine too, Genet with his black soul they “speak” to me. The troubadours, the “bad boys and girls,” the waifs, the gangsters, the drifters, grifters and midnight sifters and those who act as muses for the fallen are what makes me sit up and listen.                  

 And that brings us to Francois Villon, the “max daddy” of bad boy poets (and brigands) from the 15^th century. Strangely while I have picked up on most of my favorite poets from some academic setting I learned of Villon from two maybe unusual sources. First from the 1930s film The Petrified Forest where the Bette Davis character, Gabby, was crazy for the Villon book of poems sent from her returned to home mother in France. More importantly the poet and what he stood for was brought up in the film in conversation with Leslie Howard’s character Alan who was a Villon-like misplaced out of sorts wanderer out in the Arizona desert. The other source was a poem by Villon used as a front-piece of an article by Hunter S. Thompson who used the sentiment expressed by Villon where he considered himself a stranger in his own country (as did Thompson back in Nixon times in America).

But back to the muses, back to the gangsta muses (sorry hip-hop nation for stealing your thunder but your sing-song lyrics definitely make me think you have drawn from the same well, the same Villon well, especially guys like Biggie, Tupac, 50 cent, and Brother Cole, a brother from the same damn “sew those worn-out pants” projects neighborhood in spirit as me). Old Villon must have gotten tripped up on his DNA finding the back streets of Paris and later exile spots more attractive than the court life, the scholar’s. Trouble followed the guy wherever he moved (granted he had little room to maneuver in those days since he was a city man and not some outlaw Robin Hood working the old rural pastures and forests). His poetry speaks of drunken sots, of quick upstairs flights with besotten wenches, of tavern dark corners to plan, plan the next caper, or the next poem to explain away his life led.         

Who knows what makes a man or woman a stranger in their own land, an internal exile. Maybe like Villon it was his dismissal of the vanities of court life, the vacuity of the student life, or the lure of the outlaw life when bourgeois society (and France in the 15^th century was reaping the beggar’s banquet of bourgeois society) and it took no Karl Marx to notice that the old ways had to give way to the new city ways with their gold and death to free spirits, to those who lived outside allegiances. Maybe like Ginsberg shattered by the smoke of downtown Paterson, maybe shattered by the hysterical cries of his beloved if discarded mother, maybe shattered by the square-ness of his father-poet. Maybe like Jean bon Genet born of some ancient mix of the crime that dared not speak its name and crimes that had names. Trolling waterfronts looking for rough trade, looking for his lady of the flowers. Strangers, strangers all looking for some new Algiers, some new Casablanca, some new city a-borning.      

Yes, wanderers, waifs, strangers in a strange land, those are the poets I want to read and listen to. And what of it. 

Ballade: Du Concours De Blois

I’m dying of thirst beside the fountain,

Hot as fire, and with chattering teeth:

In my own land, I’m in a far domain:

Near the flame, I shiver beyond belief:

Bare as a worm, dressed in a furry sheathe,

I smile in tears, wait without expectation:

Taking my comfort in sad desperation:

I rejoice, without pleasures, never a one:

Strong I am, without power or persuasion,

Welcomed gladly, and spurned by everyone.

 

Nothing is sure for me but what’s uncertain:

Obscure, whatever is plainly clear to see:

I’ve no doubt, except of everything certain:

Science is what happens accidentally:

I win it all, yet a loser I’m bound to be:

Saying: ‘God give you good even!’ at dawn,

I greatly fear I’m falling, when lying down:

I’ve plenty, yet I’ve not one possession,

I wait to inherit, yet I’m no heir I own,

Welcomed gladly, and spurned by everyone.

 

I never take care, yet I’ve taken great pain

To acquire some goods, but have none by me:

Who’s nice to me is one I hate: it’s plain,

And who speaks truth deals with me most falsely:

He’s my friend who can make me believe

A white swan is the blackest crow I’ve known:

Who thinks he’s power to help me, does me harm:

Lies, truth, to me are all one under the sun:

I remember all, have the wisdom of a stone,

Welcomed gladly, and spurned by everyone.

 

Merciful Prince, may it please you that I’ve shown

There’s much I know, yet without sense or reason:

I’m partial, yet I hold with all men, in common.

What more can I do? Redeem what I’ve in pawn,

Welcomed gladly, and spurned by everyone.