LES POIS DE SENTEUR (en anglais)

Sweet Peas

Sweet thoughts, like paths tacking
Through my flesh
Into an oak wood in spring.

I open the bedroom door,
I enter, I sing.

No, you’re not far away, Apolline,
For the bright springtime of your body,
The pure tenderness of the night
And the inimitable perfume of love
Have all remained unscattered here
On your sheets blue as a May sky.

O Time, every morning
In this house
The face of life is moved to tears
As it gathers up the sun’s power.

O sweet garden flower,
O Sweet pea!


Translated from the French of Athanase Vantchev de Thracy by Norton Hodges