To a Flower, Poem by Alfred De Musset

What do you want of me, dear little flower,
Amiable and charming souvenir?
Half-dead and half-coquette,
Who makes you come all the way to me?

Wrapped beneath this seal,
You have just traveled a long road.
What did you see? What did the hand tell you
That cut you from the bush?

Are you only a withered grass
That has come to finish dying?
Or does your breast, ready to bloom again,
Enclose a thought?

Your flower, alas! has the whiteness
Of desolate innocence;
But of fearful hope
Your leaf bears the color.

Do you have some message for me?
You can speak, I am discreet.
Is your greenness a secret?
Is your perfume a language?

If so, speak low,
Mysterious messenger;
If it is nothing, do not answer;
Sleep on my heart, fresh and light.

I know that hand too well,
Full of grace and caprice,
Which with a bit of supple and fine thread
Has tied your pale calyx.

That hand, little flower,
Neither Phidias nor Praxiteles
Could have found the sister of
Except by taking Venus as a model.

It is white, it is soft and beautiful,
Frank, they say, and more still;
To whoever could capture it
It can open a treasure.

But it is wise, it is severe;
Some harm could come to me.
Little flower, let us fear her anger.
Say nothing, let me dream.

Alfred De Musset

Translation generated by Poésies 123 with assistance from the deepseek-chat artificial-intelligence model.

Text published on Poésies 123: https://www.poesies123.com/en/poem-to-a-flower-alfred-de-musset/