Literal translation
it is not good to work when the cicada sings
Meaning
it's no good working while the cicada sings
Explanation
This proverb sets the song of the cicada, the audible symbol of the crushing heat of the Provençal summer, against the physical labor that scorching heat makes painful, even dangerous. The insect's shrill song, heard mostly during the hottest hours of the day, serves here as a natural marker: when it rings out, popular wisdom advises pausing work during the hottest hours of sun exposure. The proverb reads at a first, agricultural and climatic level, a piece of common sense passed down in a rural society where field work had to accommodate Mediterranean heat, but it also carries, by extension, a broader moral about respecting the limits set by circumstance, to avoid exhausting oneself needlessly. The cicada holds a major symbolic place in Provençal culture, tied to summer, to carefree ease, and to the south of France itself, which gives the saying a deeply regional flavor well beyond its practical advice alone.