The Forest

Poem by François-René De Chateaubriand Collection Nature PaintingsThemes NaturePeriod 18th century

Silent forest, amiable solitude,
How I love to wander through your unheeded shade!
In your dark winding paths, lost in dreaming,
I feel a sentiment free of all unrest!
Enchantments of my heart! I seem to see exhale
From trees, from lawns a gentle sadness:
That water which I hear murmurs with softness,
And in the depth of the woods seems still to call me.
Oh! why can I not, happy, spend my whole life
Here, far from humankind!… At the sound of these streams,
On a carpet of flowers, on the spring grass,
May I, unknown, sleep in the shade of the elms!
All speaks, all pleases me beneath these tranquil vaults;
These brooms, ornaments of a wild retreat,
This honeysuckle touched by a light fleeing wind,
Sway in turn their moving garlands.
Forests, in your shelters keep my offered vows!
To what lover will you ever be as dear?
Others will tell you again of foreign loves;
I, of your charms alone, keep the deserts.

Chateaubriand

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