Poems of Paul Verlaine | Page 3

dream,?With looks that lose themselves in cherished looks;?The hour of steaming tea and banished books;?The sweetness of the evening at an end,?The dear fatigue, and right to rest attained,?And worshipped expectation of the night,--?Oh, all these things, in unrelenting flight,?My dream pursues through all the vain delays,?Impatient of the weeks, mad at the days!
IT SHALL BE, THEN, UPON A SUMMER'S DAY
It shall be, then, upon a summer's day:
The sun, my joy's accomplice, bright shall shine,?And add, amid your silk and satin fine,?To your dear radiance still another ray;
The heavens, like a sumptuous canopy,
Shall shake out their blue folds to droop and trail?About our happy brows, that shall be pale?With so much gladness, such expectancy;
And when day closes, soft shall be the air
That in your snowy veils, caressing, plays,?And with soft-smiling eyes the stars shall gaze?Benignantly upon the wedded pair.
Romances sans Paroles
Ariettes Oubli��es
Il pleut doucement sur la ville.--ARTHUR RIMBAUD
It weeps in my heart?As it rains on the town.?What is this dull smart?Possessing my heart?
Soft sound of the rain?On the ground and the roofs!?To a heart in pain,?O the song of the rain!
It weeps without cause?In my heart-sick heart.?In her faith, what? no flaws??This grief has no cause.
'Tis sure the worst woe?To know not wherefore?My heart suffers so?Without joy or woe.
Son joyeux, importun, d'un clavecin sonore.--P��TRUS BOREL
The keyboard, over which two slim hands float,?Shines vaguely in the twilight pink and gray,?Whilst with a sound like wings, note after note?Takes flight to form a pensive little lay?That strays, discreet and charming, faint, remote,?About the room where perfumes of Her stray.
What is this sudden quiet cradling me?To that dim ditty's dreamy rise and fall??What do you want with me, pale melody??What is it that you want, ghost musical?That fade toward the window waveringly?A little open on the garden small?
[Illustration: "Le Piano Que Baise Une Main Fr��le"]
Oh, heavy, heavy my despair,?Because, because of One so fair.
My misery knows no allay,?Although my heart has come away.
Although my heart, although my soul,?Have fled the fatal One's control.
My misery knows no allay,?Although my heart has come away.
My heart, the too, too feeling one,?Says to my soul, "Can it be done,
"Can it be done, too feeling heart,?That we from her shall live apart?"
My soul says to my heart, "Know I?What this strange pitfall should imply,
"That we, though far from her, are near,?Yea, present, though in exile here?"
Le rossignol qui du haut d'une branche se regarde?dedans, croit ��tre tomb�� dans la rivi��re. Il est au sommet?d'un chene, et toutefois il a peur de se noyer.
CYRANO DE BERGERAC.
The trees' reflection in the misty stream
Dies off in livid steam;?Whilst up among the actual boughs, forlorn,
The tender wood-doves mourn.
How wan the face, O traveller, this wan
Gray landscape looked upon;?And how forlornly in the high tree-tops
Lamented thy drowned hopes!
Paysages Belges
BRUXELLES
Hills and fences hurry by?Blent in greenish-rosy flight,?And the yellow carriage-light?Blurs all to the half-shut eye.
Slowly turns the gold to red?O'er the humble darkening vales;?Little trees that flatly spread,?Where some feeble birdling wails.
Scarcely sad, so mild and fair?This enfolding Autumn seems;?All my moody languor dreams,?Cradled by the gentle air.
Birds in the Night
I?You were not over-patient with me, dear;
This want of patience one must rightly rate:?You are so young! Youth ever was severe
And variable and inconsiderate!
You had not all the needful kindness, no;
Nor should one be amazed, unhappily:?You're very young, cold sister mine, and so
'Tis natural you should unfeeling be!
Behold me therefore ready to forgive;
Not gay, of course! but doing what I can?To bear up bravely,--deeply though I grieve
To be, through you, the most unhappy man.
II?But you will own that I was in the right
When in my downcast moods I used to say?That your sweet eyes, my hope, once, and delight!
Were come to look like eyes that will betray.
It was an evil lie, you used to swear,
And your glance, which was lying, dear, would flame,--?Poor fire, near out, one stirs to make it flare!--
And in your soft voice you would say, "Je t'aime!"
Alas! that one should clutch at happiness
In sense's, season's, everything's despite!--?But 'twas an hour of gleeful bitterness
When I became convinced that I was right!
III?And wherefore should I lay my heart-wounds bare?
You love me not,--an end there, lady mine;?And as I do not choose that one shall dare
To pity,--I must suffer without sign.
Yes, suffer! For I loved you well, did I,--
But like a loyal soldier will I stand?Till, hurt to death, he staggers off to die,
Still filled with love for an ungrateful land.
O you that were my Beauty and my Own,
Although from you derive all my mischance,?Are not you still my Home, then, you alone,
As young and mad and beautiful as France?
IV?Now I do not intend--what were the gain?--
To dwell with streaming eyes upon the past;?But yet my love which you may think lies slain,
Perhaps is only wide awake at last.
My love, perhaps,--which now is memory!--
Although beneath your blows it cringe and cry?And bleed to