You, who lent your voice to the bird announcing first light
To sing to the heavens the day’s birthday hymn; 
You, who lent your soul and sonorous pipes
To the lovebird heard cooing in the evening dim,

You who speak to the forests: answer the zephyrs! 
To the streams: murmur harmonious chords;
To torrents: roar; to the breeze: sigh! 
To the ocean: dying in moans on your shores! 

And I, Lord, also, hoping to praise your marvels: 
You gave my soul a second voice,
Purer than any voice that a human can hear, 
Stronger than the winds, the waves, and the woods!

The heavens call it grace, and mankind [calls it] genius; 
It breathed in the distant [voices of] Israel’s poets, 
An echo in my breast, which modulates
The reverberations of this mortal world!

But above all of it is Your name, O King of nature, 
Who makes this divine instrument vibrate in me; 
When I invoke your name, my heart fills with murmurs 
Resounding like a temple full of endless singing!

Like a temple filled with voices and prayers, 
Where echo upon echo rolls past the altar; 
Nay, Lord, this bronze, and this marble, and these stones -
Can they resonate better than mortal hearts? 

No, my God, no, my God, [whose] saintly grace falls on me,
I’ve never heard music rising up to you
With more penetrating chords, with more divine language, 
Than these silent concerts that rise within me!

But words fail me in my burning delirium, 
To check this fire, all my words are as ice; 
Ah! what do these things matter, Lord, my words and my lyre? 
I can hear them [inside myself], it will suffice; You respond, it is enough!

Sacred gift of the God who enflames my heart, 
Harp that trembles under my fingers, 
The eternal cry of my soul, 
My voice is meant for God alone;
I shudder from love and fear 
When [allowed] to touch your holy string, 
[Since the Holy] Spirit deigned to choose me!
Me, less than dust before Him, 
Me, whose entire soul was until now 
Nothing more than silence and desire!

Alas! and yet I blush, since [I am]
Ungrateful for the most beautiful of his gifts, 
A harp adored by angels, 
I profaned its first sounds; 
I did what any sinner would do, 
As if His hands, on the altar of life,
Had mishandled the sacred vessels, 
And he had invested the chalice, 
The Holy Grail, 
With a crown of roses!

But I swear by this shame 
Which colors my cheeks red, 
And by this hymn that rises 
To heaven from which [Jesus] descended!
I swear by the sublime name
Of [God] who can close and reopen the abyss, 
By the [holy] eye which reads the depths of human hearts,
By this sacred fire which sets me ablaze, 
And by the transports of ecstasy 
Which drench your throat with tears!

All those mortal strains… I’ve forgotten, 
We will sing of the eternal glory 
To the only worthy, holy, great, and good [God]; 
My days will be nothing more than an eternal delirium, 
My soul is only a song, and my heart is only a lyre, 
And the last time I breath in or out
Will be like a chord blessing Your name! 

Rise up, O voice of my soul
With the dawn, with the night! 
Blaze like a flame,
Scatter like noise!
Float away on a wisp of cloud, 
Merge into the winds, into thunderstorms, 
Into thunder, into the roar of the tide; 
In vain, people may brush me off;
The eternal hymn of [my] prayer 
Will echo throughout the world!

Don’t be afraid of the murmuring
Of all these stars at once, 
This thousandfold voice of nature, 
Drowning out your still, small voice!
While the [music of the] spheres roars away, 
And even seventh heaven rings
With rolling thunder, in His honor, 
The humble echo that awakens the soul 
Carries to his ear the fading sound of 
The smallest voice that says : Lord!

Rise up silently
At the time when in the evening shadows, 
The lamp of night swings, 
When the priest extinguishes the thurible; 
Rise up in the dead calm
In that profound solitude 
Where God reveals himself to the faithful! 
Sing in my final hours:
Love, there is no obscurity, 
No loneliness when you are present!

I’m no more than a mere thought, 
The [sounds of the universe] are dead in my heart,
And from under this frozen ash heap
I’ve found only the Lord. 
Whether He lights or troubles my path, 
My heart, in tears or in joy, 
Carries the thought of [God] who fills it; 
Thus in the stream rolls one reflection
And the last evening cloud 
Makes way for dawn in your heart. 

How sweet it is to know His thoughts, 
Before picking up His strains, 
Cadencing in divine meters,
Suddenly rising like incense; 
To see [a sinner’s] feeble praises, 
Accompanied by angelic harps, 
Blooming into sounds worthy of heaven, 
And before the pearly gates 
Standing with his own wings 
After a harmonious flight! 

One day, however, O my lyre, 
One day your tone will soften!
You will regret the madness
That overwhelmed my fingers:
The years will fade this iciness
As nature reminds you of
The wonders of the Holy of Holies!
Time, which withers everything it touches, 
Will delight at the sounds of my mouth 
And the images made by my hands. 

You will no longer dissolve my soul
Into a flood of harmony and love, 
But the sentiment which enflames my heart
Will survive until Judgment Day:
Just like those barren peaks
Whose age has worn away their ridges,
Their shadows, and their echoes, 
But upon whose treeless slopes
Breaks a whispering wave 
And over which heaven fuels the waves. 

Ah! just as my fragile memory, 
Like an urn from which water has evaporated, 
Will have forgotten these songs of glory 
Which your God has inspired in you today, 
[I hear] your faltering harmony:
Don’t blush, O my genius! 
When your string only has one pluck left, 
Faithful harp, sing once more to
The God I adored in my youth, 
Because His name is this hymn!