Vents, que vos plaintives rumeurs
Que vos chants, rossignols charmeurs
Aillent lui dire que je meurs

Le premier soir qu’il vint ici
Mon âme fut à sa merci
De fierté je n’eus plus souci

Mes regards étaient pleins d’aveux
Il me prit dans ses bras nerveux
Et me baisa près des cheveux

J’en eus un grand frémissement
Et puis je ne sais plus comment
Il est devenu mon amant

Je lui disais “tu m’aimeras”
Aussi longtemps que tu pourras
Je ne dormais bien qu’en ses bras

Mais lui, sentant son cœur éteint
S’en est allé l’autre matin
Sans moi, dans un pays lointain

Puisque je n’ai plus mon ami
Je mourrai dans l’étang
Parmi les fleurs sous le flot endormi

Sur le bord arrivée, au vent
Je dirai son nom, en rêvant
Que là je l’attendis souvent

Et comme en un linceul doré
Dans mes cheveux défaits
Au gré du vent je m’abandonnerai

Les bonheurs passés verseront
Leur douces lueurs sur mon front
Et les joncs verts m’enlaceront

Et mon sein croira, frémissant
Sous l’enlacement caressant
Subir l’étreinte de l’absent

Winds, may your plaintive noises,
charming nightingales, may your songs
go to tell him I’m dying!

From the first evening he came here
my soul was at his mercy.
I no longer care about pride.

My eyes kept telling him my thoughts.
He took me in his nervous arms
and kissed my head close to my hair.

That caused me a great trembling;
and then, I no longer know how,
he became my lover.

I kept saying: “You will love me
for as long as you are able!”
I would only sleep well in his arms.

But he, feeling his heart grown cold,
departed some mornings ago,
without me, for a distant land.

Because I have my lover no longer
I will die in the pond, among
the flowers, under the sleeping water.

Pausing on the edge, I will speak
his name to the wind, while dreaming
that I often awaited him there.

And as if in a golden shroud,
with my hair undone, I will let myself go
wherever the current takes me.

The happy times I have known will shed
their gentle light on my forehead;
and the green reeds will entwine me.

And my breast will believe,
as it trembles, caressed and entwined,
that the absent one is embracing me.