Le ciel d'hiver, si doux, si triste, si dormant,
Où le soleil errait parmi des vapeurs blanches,
Était pareil au doux, au profond sentiment
Qui nous rendait heureux mélancoliquement,
Par cet après-midi de baisers sous les branches.
Branches mortes qu'aucun souffle ne remuait,
Branches noires avec quelque feuille fanée,
Ah! que ta bouche s'est à ma bouche donnée
Plus tendrement encor dans ce grand bois muet,
Et dans cette langueur de la mort de l'année!
La mort de Tout sinon de Toi que j'aime tant,
Et sinon du bonheur dont mon Ame est comblée,
Bonheur qui dort au fond de cette Ame isolée,
Mystérieux, paisible et frais comme l'étang
Qui pâlissait au fond de la pâle vallée...
The winter sky, so soft, so sad, so sleepy,
through which the sun drifted in white mists,
was like the soft, the profound sentiment
which made us melancholically happy,
on that afternoon of kisses beneath the branches.
Lifeless branches which no breath stirred,
black branches with, here and there a withered leaf.
Ah! How your mouth gave itself up to mine
still more tenderly in that great silent wood,
and in this languor of the year's death!
The death of All if not You whom I love so much,
and if not the happiness with which my Soul is fulfilled,
happiness which sleeps in the depth of this lonely Soul,
mysterious, peaceful and fresh like the pond
which grew pale at the bottom of the pale valley...
© translated by Christopher Goldsack
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