Draw up your chair near mine, and stretch your
hands out towards the hearth that I may see
between your fingers the old flame burning; and
watch the fire quietly with your eyes that fear
no light, that they may be for me still franker
when a quick and flashing ray strikes to their
depths, illuminating them.
Oh! how beautiful and young still our life is
when the clock rings out with its golden tone,
and, coming closer, I brush you lightly and touch
you, and a slow and gentle fever that neither
desires to allay leads the sure and wondrous
kiss from the hands to the forehead and from the
forehead to the lips.
How I love you then, my bright beloved, in your
welcoming, gently swooning body, that encircles
me in its turn and dissolves me in its gladness!
Everything becomes dearer to me--your mouth, your
arms, your kindly breasts where my poor, tired
forehead will lie quietly near your heart after
the moment of riotous pleasure that you grant me.
For I love you still better after the sensual
hour, when your goodness, still more steadfast
and maternal, makes for me a soft repose,
following sharp ardour, and when, after desire
has cried out its violence, I hear approaching
our regular happiness with steps so gentle that
they are but silence.
V
Be once more merciful and cheering to us, light,
pale brightness of winter that will bathe our
brows when of an afternoon we both go into the
garden to breathe in one last warmth.
We loved you long ago with so great a pride, with
so great a love springing from our hearts, that
one supreme and gentle and kindly flame is due to
us at this hour when grief awaits us.
You are that which no man ever forgets, from the
day when you first struck his victorious arms,
and when, on the coming of evening, you slept in
his eyes with your dead splendour and vanquished
strength.
And for us you were always the visible fervour
that, being everywhere diffused and shining in
fevers of deep and stinging ardour, seemed to
start for the infinite from our heart.