Chapter VII

Gently, more gently still, cradle my head in your
arms, my fevered brow and my weary eyes;

Gently, more gently still, kiss my lips, and
say to me those words that are sweeter at each
dawn when your voice repeats them, and you have
surrendered, and I love you still.

The day rises sullen and heavy; the night was
crossed by monstrous dreams; the rain and its
long hair whip our casement, and the horizon is
black with clouds of grief.

Gently, more gently still, cradle my head in your
arms, my fevered brow and my weary eyes; you are
my hopeful dawn, with its caress in your hands
and its light in your sweet words;

See, I am re-born, without pain or shock, to the
daily labour that traces its mark on my road,
and instils into my life the will to be a weapon
of strength and beauty in the golden grasp of an
honoured life.

VIII

In the house chosen by our love as its
birth-place, with its cherished furniture
peopling the shadows and the nooks, where we live
together, having as sole witnesses the roses that
watch us through the windows,

Certain days stand out of so great a consolation,
certain hours of summer so lovely in their
silence, that sometimes I stop time that swings
with its golden disc in the oaken clock.

Then the hour, the day, the night is so much ours
that the happiness that hovers lightly over us
hears nothing but the throbbing of your heart and
mine that are brought close together by a sudden
embrace.

IX

The pleasant task with the window open and the
shadow of the green leaves and the passage of
the sun on the ruddy paper, maintains the gentle
violence of its silence in our good and pensive
house.

And the flowers bend nimbly and the large fruits
shine from branch to branch, and the blackbirds,
the bullfinches and the chaffinches sing and
sing, so that my verses may burst forth clear and
fresh, pure and true, like their songs, their
golden flesh and their scarlet petals.

And I see you pass in the garden, sometimes
mingled with the sun and shadow; but your head
does not turn, so that the hour in which I work
jealousy at these frank and gentle poems may not
be disturbed.

X

In the depth of our love dwells all faith; we
bind up a glowing thought together with the least
things: the awakening of a bud, the decline of a
rose, the flight of a frail and beautiful bird
that, by turns, appears or disappears in the
shadow or the light.

A nest falling to pieces on the mossy edge of
a roof and ravaged by the wind fills the mind
with dread. An insect eating the heart of the
hollyhocks terrifies: all is fear, all is hope.

Though reason with its sharp and soothing snow
may suddenly cool these charming pangs, what
matters! Let us accept them without inquiring
overmuch into the false, the true, the evil or
the good they portend;

Let us be happy that we can be as children,
believing in their fatal or triumphant power, and
let us guard with closed shutters against too
sensible people.