Lovely singer of the grove!
   Nature drinks bliss;
When you flute [your song] in the bouquet of the fences
   Of the springtime meadow strewn with blossoms.

Your throat melts rapture
   Into the deeply oppressed bosom,
And in angelic glances shines the joy
   Which I lacked for so long.

Your fluttering, accompanied by song,
   Wafts like a whispering from the sepulchre;
Your outspread feathers float
   Through the air like the west-wind.

As clouds of incense smoulder;
   As at the starry throne of God
The songs of the seraphs sound like a psalm,
   Thus surges your heaven-filled tone.

The rejoicing swarm of finches
   Only whirrs upward during the  day .
The joyful choir of larks only soughs
   To the merry shining of the sun,

But when the torch of Hesperus gleams,
   The proud melody falls silent:
When the moon floats in clouds,
   Then you awaken melancholy.

Everything flees the quiet hills,
   Where forget-me-nots bloom forth;
Only you fold your soft wings
   When the dear little stars move in their courses.

Gladly you waft about the shadows
   That pass by in the whispering of the wind,
There where death mates with life,
   Where the rosemary grows!