The mountain surrounds a limpid lake
Of a calm and captive silver-green
Like the waist of the wedded, a sylph
A besotted body, light, loved by the wind like the yew
Where are you escaping to, peaceful flow
In your fertile floor above which there is plenty of lives?
To the point of triggering the blue sea’s breeze jealousy
You hold, silent, Lamartine’s soul
He described you, lake, time’s metaphor
On your shiny waters, necklace of photophore
The sun beholds you, skimming your sides
Like the poet’s quill, your white bird.

What did he see in his prophetic century
Hurt by a soft and painful romanticism?
Holding you in his arm, his altar, in love with
Your richness, your serenity that the poet
Afflicted by time couldn’t feel
Save for his apostrophe, his eternal sigh
To you then, oh lake, the whisper of a scripture
That is known only by you, enigma in literature
Story with the man with words and scars
You contain in your dome, his most beautiful enamels.


Translated on August, 24 2015