To Laure

Poem by Alfred De Musset Collection Early PoemsThemes LovePeriod 19th century

If you did not love me, tell me, thoughtless girl,
What were you stammering in those fateful nights?
Were you training your tongue to mock your thought?
What then did those tears mean, that oppressed breast,
Those sobs and those cries?

Ah! if pleasure alone drew from you those endearments,
If it was but pleasure that in a sad moment
On my lips on fire you covered with caresses
Like a single lover;

If mind and senses, kisses and tears,
Are held hand in hand from your mouth to your heart,
And if you must thus, to find charms in it,
On the altar of pleasure profane happiness:

Ah! Laurette! ah! Laurette, idol of my life,
If the dark demon of your sleepless nights
Without this mask of fire could not take a step,
Why did you summon it, if you did not love me?

Alfred De Musset

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