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Read Ebook: Poems of Paul Verlaine by Verlaine Paul McCarter Henry Illustrator Brownell Gertrude Hall Translator
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Ebook has 75 lines and 6439 words, and 2 pages
Off, be off, now, graceless pack: Get you gone, lost children mine: Your release is earned in fine: The Chimaera lends her back.
Huddling on her, go, God-sped, As a dream-horde crowds and cowers Mid the shadowy curtain-flowers Round a sick man's haunted bed.
Hold! My hand, unfit before, Feeble still, but feverless, And which palpitates no more Save with a desire to bless,
Blesses you, O little flies Of my black suns and white nights. Spread your rustling wings, arise, Little griefs, little delights,
LANGUEUR
I am the Empire in the last of its decline, That sees the tall, fair-haired Barbarians pass,--the while Composing indolent acrostics, in a style Of gold, with languid sunshine dancing in each line.
The solitary soul is heart-sick with a vile Ennui. Down yon, they say, War's torches bloody shine. Alas, to be so faint of will, one must resign The chance of brave adventure in the splendid file,--
Of death, perchance! Alas, so lagging in desire! Ah, all is drunk! Bathyllus, hast done laughing, pray? Ah, all is drunk,--all eaten! Nothing more to say!
Alone, a vapid verse one tosses in the fire; Alone, a somewhat thievish slave neglecting one; Alone, a vague disgust of all beneath the sun!
Nagu?re
Glimm'ring twilight things are these, Visions of the end of night. Truth, thou lightest them, I wis, Only with a distant light,
Or if these uncertain ghosts Shall take body bye and bye, And uniting with the hosts Tented by the azure sky,
Framed by Nature's setting meet,-- Offer up in one accord From the heart's ecstatic heat, Incense to the living Lord!
Parall?lement
IMPRESSION FAUSSE
Dame mouse patters Black against the shadow grey; Dame mouse patters Grey against the black.
Hear the bed-time bell! Sleep forthwith, good prisoners; Hear the bed-time bell! You must go to sleep.
No disturbing dream! Think of nothing but your loves: No disturbing dream, Of the fair ones think!
Moonlight clear and bright! Some one of the neighbors snores; Moonlight clear and bright-- He is troublesome.
Comes a pitchy cloud Creeping o'er the faded moon; Comes a pitchy cloud-- See the grey dawn creep!
Dame mouse patters Pink across an azure ray; Dame mouse patters.... Sluggards, up! 'tis day!
Po?mes Saturniens
Melancholia
NEVERMORE
Remembrance, what wilt thou with me? The year Declined; in the still air the thrush piped clear, The languid sunshine did incurious peer Among the thinned leaves of the forest sere.
We were alone, and pensively we strolled, With straying locks and fancies, when, behold Her turn to let her thrilling gaze enfold, And ask me in her voice of living gold,
Her fresh young voice, "What was thy happiest day?" I smiled discreetly for all answer, and Devotedly I kissed her fair white hand.
--Ah, me! The earliest flowers, how sweet are they! And in how exquisite a whisper slips The earliest "Yes" from well-beloved lips!
APR?S TROIS ANS
When I had pushed the narrow garden-door, Once more I stood within the green retreat; Softly the morning sunshine lighted it, And every flow'r a humid spangle wore.
Nothing is changed. I see it all once more: The vine-clad arbor with its rustic seat.... The waterjet still plashes silver sweet, The ancient aspen rustles as of yore.
The roses throb as in a bygone day, As they were wont, the tall proud lilies sway. Each bird that lights and twitters is a friend.
I even found the Flora standing yet, Whose plaster crumbles at the alley's end, --Slim, 'mid the foolish scent of mignonette.
MON R?VE FAMILIER
Oft do I dream this strange and penetrating dream: An unknown woman, whom I love, who loves me well, Who does not every time quite change, nor yet quite dwell The same,--and loves me well, and knows me as I am.
For she knows me! My heart, clear as a crystal beam To her alone, ceases to be inscrutable To her alone, and she alone knows to dispel My grief, cooling my brow with her tears' gentle stream.
Is she of favor dark or fair?--I do not know. Her name? All I remember is that it doth flow Softly, as do the names of them we loved and lost.
Her eyes are like the statues',--mild and grave and wide; And for her voice she has as if it were the ghost Of other voices,--well-loved voices that have died.
A UNE FEMME
To you these lines for the consoling grace Of your great eyes wherein a soft dream shines, For your pure soul, all-kind!--to you these lines From the black deeps of mine unmatched distress.
'Tis that the hideous dream that doth oppress My soul, alas! its sad prey ne'er resigns, But like a pack of wolves down mad inclines Goes gathering heat upon my reddened trace!
I suffer, oh, I suffer cruelly! So that the first man's cry at Eden lost Was but an eclogue surely to my cry!
And that the sorrows, Dear, that may have crossed Your life, are but as swallows light that fly --Dear!--in a golden warm September sky.
Paysages Tristes
CHANSON D'AUTOMNE
Leaf-strewing gales Utter low wails Like violins,-- Till on my soul Their creeping dole Stealthily wins....
Days long gone by! In such hour, I, Choking and pale, Call you to mind,-- Then like the wind Weep I and wail.
And, as by wind Harsh and unkind, Driven by grief, Go I, here, there, Recking not where, Like the dead leaf.
LE ROSSIGNOL
Caprices
IL BACIO
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