I'm unable to feel, to be human, to reach out
From inside my sad soul to my fellow earthly brothers.
And even were I to feel, I'm unable to be useful, practical, quotidian, definite,
To have a place in life, a destiny among men,
To have a vocation, a force, a will, a garden,
A reason for resting, a need for recreation,
Something that comes to me directly from nature.

So be motherly to me, O tranquil night . . .
You who remove the world from the world, you who are peace,
You who don't exist, who are only the absence of light,
You who aren't a thing, a place, an essence or a life,
Penelope who weaves darkness that tomorrow will be unravelled,
Unreal Circe of the fevered, of the anguished without a cause,
Come to me, O night, reach out your hands,
And be coolness and relief, O night, on my forehead . . .