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De profundis clamavi I implore your pity, You, the only one I love,
From the depths of the dark chasm into which my heart has fallen.
It is a gloomy universe with a leaden horizon,
In which horror and blasphemy swim at night;
A sun with no warmth shines above for six months,
And the other six months the night covers the earth;
It is a place more naked than the polar lands;
-- Neither beasts, nor streams, nor foliage, nor woods!
Indeed there is no horror on earth that surpasses
The cold cruely of that sun made of ice
And the immense night, like ancient Chaos;
I envy the fate of the most vile of animals,
Who at least can plunge into a stupid slumber,
So slowly does the skein of time measure itself out!
Original French
(All translations by Cat Nilan © 1999, 2004) |