Let Us Sit Together by the Roadside

Poem by Emile Verhaeren Period 19th century

Let us sit together by the roadside,
On the old bench eaten with mold,
And let me leave, between your two sure hands,
My hand to abandon itself for a long while.

With my hand that long abandons itself
To the sweetness of feeling itself on your knees,
My heart too, my fervent and gentle heart
Seems to rest, between your two kind hands.

And it is the intense joy and it is the profound love
That we taste in feeling so good together,
Without a single word too loud trembling on our lips,
Nor even a kiss going to burn your forehead.

And we would prolong the ardor of this silence
And the stillness of our mute desires,
Were it not that suddenly, feeling them quiver,
I clasp, without meaning to, your hands that think;

Your hands, where all my happiness remains hidden
And which never, for anything in the world,
Would encroach upon those profound things
By which we live, without having to speak of them.

Emile Verhaeren

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

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