YOU WERE SLEEPING...

Encased in my hands like a strange gem
Your head was shining;
For it I imagined jewel-cases, and light for light,
Shadow for shadow, I esteemed its beauty.

In your eyes perhaps life was gathering
Like a filter of sorrow,
In two deep vases… I dreamt
Your head was a marble flower…

When, in your forehead whitened by moonlight,
Like a monster in the stillness of a lake,
There emerged an enormous, silent dream…

Ah! your head frightened me… there flowed
From it a hidden life… It resembled
I know not what world anonymous and nocturnal…