Translation: L'Invitation au voyage (Baudelaire)
by evie-brill-paffard
My child, my lover,
Come away to discover
Continents far and new!
To love and to sigh,
To dream and to die
In a land as exotic as you!
Humid suns wink
Behind cloudy skies
So alluring and charming
So strangely alarming
With crocodile lids blink
Like the tears in your eyes.
There, all is order, beauty and leisure
Luxury, calm, quiet and pleasure.
Wood panels beaming
Polished and gleaming
Would decorate our room;
The rarest of flowers
In the height of their bloom
We’d while away the hours
Inhaling amber in our lungs,
Walls with deep mirrors hung
Our souls would feast,
On the wonders of the East
Whispering a sweet native tongue.
There, all is order, beauty and leisure
Luxury, calm, quiet and pleasure.
The aqueducts have, nestled,
In a drowsy slumber
With vagabond vessels
Lined unencumbered
Their sails unfurled
They come from the ends of the world.
- The twilight sky clouded
Leaving pastures shrouded,
The canals, the entire town,
Glows amber and blue;
The night falls down
In a soft, warm hue.
There, all is order, beauty and leisure
Luxury, calm, quiet and pleasure.