The Son of Titian

Poem by Alfred De Musset Collection New PoemsPeriod 19th century

When I read Petrarch, still a child,
I wished to have some share of glory.
He loved as a poet and sang as a lover;
He alone knew how to use the language of the gods.

He alone had the secret of seizing in passing
The heartbeats that last but a moment,
And, rich with a smile, he engraved its image
With the tip of a golden stylus on a pure diamond.

O you who address a friendly word to me,
Who wrote it yesterday and will forget it tomorrow,
Remember me, who thanks you for it.

I have the heart of Petrarch and not his genius;
I can here below only give along the way
My hand to whoever calls me, my life to whoever loves me.

Alfred De Musset

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

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