To Those Who Are Leaving | While there, in the distance, ships appear

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by Émile Verhaeren (1855 - 1916)

Translation © by Grant Hicks

A ceux qui partent

Language: French (Français)

Our translations: ENG

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Tandis qu'au loin, là-bas, des navires s'éclairent,
        Toutes leurs voiles battant l'air,
        Au ras des vagues, sur la mer,
Comme des aigles d'or passent les vents solaires.

        Les flots s'enflent, géants et fous.
        Bons matelots, embarquez-vous.

L'aube est fière, l'heure est belle comme la gloire ;
        La côte entière est comme un seuil,
        Pour les [pas larges]¹ de l'orgueil
Qui vont rôdant de promontoire en promontoire.

        Les flots s'enflent, géants et fous.
        Bons matelots, embarquez-vous.

Choisissez bien le port d'où partiront vos rêves
        Et puis, sans nuls regrets, allez
        Vers les foules aux fronts hâlés
Dont les désirs sont droits comme un faisceau de glaives.

        Les flots s'enflent, géants et fous.
        Bons matelots, embarquez-vous.

Voici la merveilleuse immensité des eaux
        Et les grands flots ornés de crêtes
        Se soulevant, vers les conquêtes,
Comme des escaliers d'écume et de joyaux.

        Les flots s'enflent, géants et fous.
        Bons matelots, embarquez-vous.

Les horizons sont pleins de couronnes flottantes,
        Quel est le chef, quel est le front,
        Où tout à coup se fixeront
Les cercles d'or de leurs lueurs omnipotentes ?

        Les flots s'enflent, géants et fous.
        Bons matelots, embarquez-vous.

Available sung texts: (what is this?)

• A. Doyen

View text without footnotes

Confirmed with Emile Verhaeren, Les forces tumultueuses, Paris: Mercure de France, 1916, pages 171-172.

Note for stanza 5, line 4: the 1916 edition of the text contains a typo "deglaives" that has been corrected to "de glaives" above .

¹ Doyen: "larges pas"

Text Authorship:

by Émile Verhaeren (1855 - 1916), "A ceux qui partent", written 1902?, appears in Les Forces tumultueuses, in 16. Les cris de ma vie, no. 10, Paris, Éd. du Mercure de France, first published 1902 [author's text checked 2 times against a primary source]

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

by Albert Doyen (1882 - 1935), "A ceux qui partent", published 1914 [ medium voice and piano ], from Poème lyrique, sur 6 poésies de : Verhaeren, Vildrac, Nietzche, Spire, Duhamel, Verlaine, no. 1, Paris, Éd. Alphonse Leduc [sung text checked 1 time]

Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

ENG English (Grant Hicks) , "To Those Who Are Leaving", copyright © 2026, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

Research team for this page: Emily Ezust [Administrator] , Grant Hicks [Guest Editor] , Andrew Schneider [Guest Editor]

This text was added to the website: 2019-05-18
Line count: 30
Word count: 185

To Those Who Are Leaving

Language: English after the French (Français)

Choose for Diff

While there, in the distance, ships appear,
        All their sails beating the air,
        Down near the waves, on the sea,
Like golden eagles the sun-driven winds pass by.

        The billows swell, gigantic and wild.
        Good sailors, get on board.

The dawn is proud, the hour is grand as glory;
        The whole coast is like a threshold 
        For the broad paces of pride
That go roaming from bluff to bluff.

        The billows swell, gigantic and wild.
        Good sailors, get on board.

Choose well the harbor whence your dreams will sail
        And then, regretting nothing, make your way 
        Towards the throngs with tanned faces
Whose desires are as direct as a bundle of swords.

        The billows swell, gigantic and wild.
        Good sailors, get on board.

Behold the wonderful immensity of the waters
        And the great whitecapped billows
        That rise up to their conquests
Like staircases of foam and jewels.

        The billows swell, gigantic and wild.
        Good sailors, get on board.

The horizons are full of floating crowns.
        What is the head, what is the brow,
        On which all at once will be placed 
The golden circles of their all-powerful gleaming?

        The billows swell, gigantic and wild.
        Good sailors, get on board.

Note for stanza 2, line 4, "sun-driven winds": The term used by Verhaeren, vents solaires, means literally "solar winds." Although this phrase usually means in French what it does in English, fluxes of charged particles emitted by the sun, the poet was instead referring to "moderate winds" that, according to the online Trésor dictionary, "seem to follow the progress of the sun, changing direction depending on the hour of the day." The closest English equivalent is probably "diurnal winds."

Text Authorship:

Translation from French (Français) to English copyright © 2026 by Grant Hicks, (re)printed on this website with kind permission. To reprint and distribute this author's work for concert programs, CD booklets, etc., you may ask the copyright-holder(s) directly or ask us; we are authorized to grant permission on their behalf. Please provide the translator's name when contacting us.
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Based on:

a text in French (Français) by Émile Verhaeren (1855 - 1916), "A ceux qui partent", written 1902?, appears in Les Forces tumultueuses, in 16. Les cris de ma vie, no. 10, Paris, Éd. du Mercure de France, first published 1902
- Go to the text page.

This text was added to the website: 2026-08-23
Line count: 30
Word count: 199