Flowers of Dawn

Poem by Charles-Nérée Beauchemin Collection ArrayPeriod 19th century

As in the spring of the other year,
In the month of flowers, after the cold,
On some beautiful morning,
We shall go again into the woods.

There we shall see the same things,
The same glorious awakening,
And the same metamorphoses
Of all that lives in the sun.

There we shall see the great skeletons
Of the gray trees, resurrect,
And the closed eyes of the violets
Throb in the light.

Beneath the bright, tender-green foliage,
The turtledoves of the thickets,
On that day, will make us hear
Their slow and soft songs.

Together we shall go again
To gather in the meadows, in the morning,
These bouquets the color of dawn
That smell of rose and thyme.

We shall drink there the subtle scent,
The heady blond aromas
That, in the warm and pure air, distills
The hot flora of the valleys.

Radiant, shaking off the frost
And the hoarfrost of last year,
Our dear hopes will be able to live again
In the good old spring sun.

While waiting for everything to be reborn,
For everything to love and live again one day,
Let our dreams, O youth,
Fly away toward your woods of love!

Dear idyll, your primroses
Bloom in every season;
They defy the severe cold
And pierce the snow in abundance.

Eternal renewal, your saps
Rise even in cooled hearts,
And your heady, brief flowers
Intoxicate us as in times gone by.

Oh! yes, we shall gather again,
As fresh as on the other morning,
These beautiful bouquets the color of dawn
That smell of rose and thyme.

Charles-Nérée Beauchemin

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