I Love the Spider, Poem by Victor Hugo

I love the spider and I love the nettle,
Because they are hated;
And because nothing grants and everything punishes
Their gloomy wish;

Because they are cursed, puny,
Black creeping beings;
Because they are the sad captives
Of their own ambush;

Because they are caught in their own work;
O fate! fatal knots!
Because the nettle is a snake,
The spider a beggar;

Because they have the shadow of the abyss,
Because they are shunned,
Because they are both victims
Of the dark night…

Passersby, show mercy to the obscure plant,
To the poor animal.
Pity the ugliness, pity the sting,
Oh! pity the evil!

There is nothing that does not have its melancholy;
Everything wants a kiss.
In their wild horror, if one but forgets
To crush them,

If one but casts on them a less superb eye,
Softly, far from the day,
The vile beast and the bad weed
Murmur: Love!

Victor Hugo

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-i-love-the-spider-victor-hugo/