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« The day is not more pure than the depths of my
heart »
Racine,
Phèdre, IV,2
Love me as I love you, O my love!!
Come, O my love,
dress my tired poem
with tender looks!
What rushes through my blood
shines deep in my flesh
and is reflected in my song,
that book of rippling water,
that page of golden primroses!
Love me as I love you, O my love!
O my love, you know
your name is the pure light
that sails and shivers in me,
the free-flowing stream that floods with blue melodies
my trembling bones and the earth I live on!
You, my love, dawn before the dawn,
tree of fire, snow seeded
with red blossom!
Love me as I love you, O my love!
This living passion that burns me,
these words that weave the blazing weft of life,
this fierce mistrust of language
that gives this taste of love to the dryness in my throat,
this transparency of words and things
that keeps closed the rich curtains of death,
the dazzle of a smile, the scented hand of evening
that never ceases to vibrate in my verse,
are you, O my love.
Love me as I love you, O my love!
This bush covered in pink and white flowers,
this scraps of thick sentences,
these lines light as the satin imprecision of the dawn,
these silences interrupted by the harmonious song of larks
and fresh flames,
are you, O my love!
Love me as I love you, O my love!
Love me tonight when, frozen with fear, my hand
trembles,
like an amber dragonfly on the stem of a young buttercup,
love me at this hour when the shepherd’s bright star
will no longer lay on the river of my breast
and the song of the bird of love
exhausts the mauve of the sky with its inexhaustible lament!
Love me as I love you, O my love!
Come, O my love, put the fire of your arms
on the fire of my enchanted temples,
the silk of the shadow against the silk of your eyes,
marbled stars with the green odour of fresh apples,
kisses that make the irises bloom and scent before their time,
and make the almond tree of your breasts shiver with light
in the right hand of the night!
Love me as I love you, O my love!
Translated from the French by Norton Hodges
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