And don't you see that changeableness,
Is to lose time's joy in heart's yearning?
Is to lose time's joy in heart's yearning?
19th Century French Poetry
All is sentient!
Pythagoras
Free-thinker, Man, do you think you alone
Think, while life explodes everywhere?
Your freedom employs the powers you own,
But world is absent from all your affairs.
Respect an active spirit in the creature:
Each flower is a soul open to Nature;
In metal a mystery of love is sleeping;
'All is sentient! ' Has power over your being.
Fear the gaze in the blind wall that watches:
There is a verb attached to matter itself. . .
Do not let it serve some impious purpose!
Often a hidden god inhabits obscure being;
And like an eye, born, covered by its eyelids,
Pure spirit grows beneath the surface of stones!
Alfred de Musset (1810-1857)
Alfred de Musset
'Alfred de Musset'
Four men in the life of George Sand. Jules Sandeau. Chopin. Prosper Merimee. Alfred de Musset, 1904-7
The New York Public Library: Digital Collections
Song
I said to my heart, my feeble heart:
It's enough surely to love one's mistress?
And don't you see that changeableness,
Is to lose time's joy in heart's yearning?
My heart replied: It's never enough,
It's never enough to love one's mistress;
And don't you see that changeableness
Makes past delights dearer and sweeter?
I said to my heart, my feeble heart;
Haven't we had enough of sadness?
And don't you see that changeableness
Is to find new grief with every footstep?
My heart replied: It's never enough
We'll never have had enough of sadness:
And don't you see that changeableness
Makes past pain dearer to us, and sweeter?
Barbarina's Song
Going to the wars, Knight, so fair
What will you there
So far from home?
Don't you see that night is deep,
The world brings care
To those who roam?
You who believe love left behind
Flees the mind,
Alas, alas!
Seekers of fame, your living name,
Your smoke and flame
Will swiftly pass.
Going to the wars, Knight, so fair,
What will you there,
So far from home?
For this I'll weep, who was beguiled
And told my smile
Was sweeter so.
On a Dead Lady
She was beautiful, if Night
Who sleeps in the darkened chapel
Where Michelangelo made light,
Unmoving, can be beautiful.
She was good, if it suffice
For hand to open, give in passing,
Without God seeing anything,
If coins are alms: as cold as ice.
She thought, if the empty noise
Of a sweet harmonious voice
Like a murmuring stream, untaught,
Could make one believe in thought.
She prayed, if two lovely eyes,
Now fixed on earth
Now on the skies
Can claim a prayer's birth.
She would have smiled, if the flower
That never bloomed, to please,
Could open to the coolest hour
Of passing and forgetful breeze.
Pythagoras
Free-thinker, Man, do you think you alone
Think, while life explodes everywhere?
Your freedom employs the powers you own,
But world is absent from all your affairs.
Respect an active spirit in the creature:
Each flower is a soul open to Nature;
In metal a mystery of love is sleeping;
'All is sentient! ' Has power over your being.
Fear the gaze in the blind wall that watches:
There is a verb attached to matter itself. . .
Do not let it serve some impious purpose!
Often a hidden god inhabits obscure being;
And like an eye, born, covered by its eyelids,
Pure spirit grows beneath the surface of stones!
Alfred de Musset (1810-1857)
Alfred de Musset
'Alfred de Musset'
Four men in the life of George Sand. Jules Sandeau. Chopin. Prosper Merimee. Alfred de Musset, 1904-7
The New York Public Library: Digital Collections
Song
I said to my heart, my feeble heart:
It's enough surely to love one's mistress?
And don't you see that changeableness,
Is to lose time's joy in heart's yearning?
My heart replied: It's never enough,
It's never enough to love one's mistress;
And don't you see that changeableness
Makes past delights dearer and sweeter?
I said to my heart, my feeble heart;
Haven't we had enough of sadness?
And don't you see that changeableness
Is to find new grief with every footstep?
My heart replied: It's never enough
We'll never have had enough of sadness:
And don't you see that changeableness
Makes past pain dearer to us, and sweeter?
Barbarina's Song
Going to the wars, Knight, so fair
What will you there
So far from home?
Don't you see that night is deep,
The world brings care
To those who roam?
You who believe love left behind
Flees the mind,
Alas, alas!
Seekers of fame, your living name,
Your smoke and flame
Will swiftly pass.
Going to the wars, Knight, so fair,
What will you there,
So far from home?
For this I'll weep, who was beguiled
And told my smile
Was sweeter so.
On a Dead Lady
She was beautiful, if Night
Who sleeps in the darkened chapel
Where Michelangelo made light,
Unmoving, can be beautiful.
She was good, if it suffice
For hand to open, give in passing,
Without God seeing anything,
If coins are alms: as cold as ice.
She thought, if the empty noise
Of a sweet harmonious voice
Like a murmuring stream, untaught,
Could make one believe in thought.
She prayed, if two lovely eyes,
Now fixed on earth
Now on the skies
Can claim a prayer's birth.
She would have smiled, if the flower
That never bloomed, to please,
Could open to the coolest hour
Of passing and forgetful breeze.
