For a good hour I have been singing lays
in langue d'oc to a woman who knows
only langue d'oïl, an odd Picard dialect
at that.
The European love lyric is flourishing
with every tremor of my voice,
yet a friend has had to tap my shoulder
to tell me she has not caught a word.
My sentiments are tangled like kites
in the branches of her incomprehension,
and soon I will be lost in an anthology
and poets will no longer wear hats like mine.
Provence will be nothing more
than a pink hue on a map or an answer on a test.
And still the woman smiles over at me
feigning this look of sisterly understanding.
Plight of the Troubadour was written by Billy Collins.
Billy Collins released Plight of the Troubadour on Fri Jan 01 1988.