Jocelyn, September 17, 1793

Poem by Alphonse De Lamartine Period 19th century

You have given me this fulfillment of life,
My God! my thirst for love is finally quenched.
From the day this child came beneath my grotto,
All that I once dreamed, I have known.
For the first time, I, whose isolated soul
Until now had never mingled with others,
I who always found in what approached me
Something less than my heart was seeking;
In the face, the gaze, the sound of voice, the gesture,
In the emanation of that celestial ray,
In the first sweetness of the first conversation,
In this child’s heart I recognized my own.
My soul, which its vague solitude was gnawing,
Poured out upon him all its fullness,
And my deluded heart, no longer counting the days,
Believes that in loving him since yesterday it has loved him forever.

Alphonse de Lamartine

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

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