Ballad to the Moon, Poem by Alfred De Musset

It was, in the brown night,
On the yellowed steeple,
The moon
Like a dot on an i.

Moon, what somber spirit
Walks at the end of a thread,
In the shadow,
Your face and your profile?

Are you the eye of the one-eyed sky?
What sniveling cherub
Peers at us
Under your pallid mask?

Are you nothing but a ball,
Just a big fat harvestman
That rolls
Without legs and without arms?

Are you, I suspect,
The old iron clock face
That strikes
The hour for the damned in hell?

On your forehead that travels.
Tonight have they counted
What age
To their eternity?

Is it a worm that gnaws you
When your blackened disk
Stretches
Into a shrunken crescent?

Who had put out your eye,
The other night? Had you
Banged yourself
On some pointed tree?

For you came, pale and gloomy
To stick on my windowpanes
Your horn
Through the bars.

Go, moribund moon,
The beautiful body of Phoebe
The blonde
Has fallen into the sea.

You are only her face
And already, all wrinkled,
Is fading
Your dispossessed forehead.

Give us back the huntress,
White, with virginal breast,
Who presses
Some morning stag!

Oh! under the green plane tree
Under the fresh hazels,
Diana,
And her great greyhounds!

The black kid who doubts,
Hanging on a rock,
Listens to her,
Listens to her approach.

And, following their quarries,
Through the valleys, through the wheat,
The meadows,
Her dogs have gone off.

Oh! in the evening, in the breeze,
Phoebe, sister of Apollo,
Surprised
In the shade, one foot in the water!

Phoebe who, in the closed night,
On the lips of a shepherd
Settles,
Like a light bird.

Moon, in our memory,
Of your beautiful loves
The story
Will always embellish you.

And always rejuvenated,
You will be by the passerby
Blessed,
Full moon or crescent.

The old shepherd will love you,
Alone, while at your brow
Of alabaster
His mastiffs bark.

The pilot will love you
In his great ship,
That floats,
Under the clear firmament!

And the nimble little girl
Who passes the bush,
Light-footed,
Singing her song.

Like a bear on a chain,
Always under your blue eyes
Drags itself
The mountainous ocean.

And whether it winds or snows
I myself, every evening,
What do I do,
Coming here to sit?

I come to see at dusk,
On the yellowed steeple,
The moon
Like a dot on an i.

Perhaps when he loses his voice
Some poor husband,
Wicked one,
From afar you smile at him.

In his bitter sorrow,
When to the blessed son-in-law
The mother
Hands over the key to the nest,

His foot in his slipper,
There is the spouse all ready
Who blows out
The indiscreet candle.

At the modest hymeneal

The virgin who thinks herself
Led,
Shivers in her cold bed,

But the gentleman all aflame
Begins to rough up
Madame,
Who begins to cry out.

“” Ugh! he says, I am working,
My good woman, and doing nothing
Worthwhile;
You are not holding yourself well. “”

And quickly he hurries.
But what hidden demon
Prevents him
From committing a sin?

“” Ah! he says, let us be careful.
What curious witness
Is watching
With those two big eyes? “”

And it is, in the brown night,
On his yellowed steeple,
The moon
Like a dot on an i.

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-ballad-to-the-moon-alfred-de-musset/