Adoration | I long to surround you with angelic scents

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by Henri Cazalis (1840 - 1909), as Jean Lahor

Translation © by Grant Hicks

Adoration

Language: French (Français)

Our translations: ENG

Je voudrais t'entourer de parfums angéliques, 
Je te voudrais bercer en d'anciennes musiques, 
Dont le charme trop doux ferait couler tes pleurs ; 
Je te voudrais parer de fleurs rares, de fleurs 
Souffrantes, qui mourraient pâles sur ton corps pâle ; 
Et je voudrais à l'heure où la mystique opale,  
La lune monterait dans le bleu firmament, 
Me pencher près de toi religieusement,
Et quand ton âme alors serait tout attendrie
Par la nuit languissante et d'étoiles fleurie,
Te murmurer, frôlé par tes cheveux soyeux, 
Des propos caressants et doux comme tes yeux.

Confirmed with Œuvres de Jean Lahor. L'illusion, Paris, Alphonse Lemerre, 1925, page 14.

Text Authorship:

by Henri Cazalis (1840 - 1909), as Jean Lahor, "Adoration", written 1875, appears in L'Illusion, in 1. Chants de l'Amour et de la Mort, Paris, Éd. Alphonse Lemerre, first published 1875 [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 Émile Chaumont (1878 - 1942), "Adoration", published 1925 [ medium voice and piano ], Paris, Éditions Maurice Senart [sung text not yet checked]
by Maurice Le Corbeiller (flourished c1931), "Adoration", published 1931 [ medium voice and piano ], Paris, Éd. Durand [sung text not yet checked]
by Robert Ravarin (1890 - 1917), "Adoration", 1907 [ medium voice and piano ], from Mélodies, no. 5 [sung text not yet checked]

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

This text was added to the website: 2018-12-06
Line count: 12
Word count: 91

Adoration

Language: English after the French (Français)

I long to surround you with angelic scents,
I long to cradle you in ancient music,
Whose too sweet charms would bring you to tears;
I long to adorn you with rare flowers, ailing 
Flowers that would die pale upon your pale body;
And I long, at the hour when that mystic opal,
The moon, rises in the blue firmament,
To bend over you reverently,
And then when your soul is deeply moved
By the languid night and the blossoming stars,
To murmur to you, brushed by your silken hair,
Words as tender and soft as your eyes.

Text Authorship:

Translation from French (Français) to English copyright © 2025 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.
Contact: licenses@email.lieder.example.net

Based on:

a text in French (Français) by Henri Cazalis (1840 - 1909), as Jean Lahor, "Adoration", written 1875, appears in L'Illusion, in 1. Chants de l'Amour et de la Mort, Paris, Éd. Alphonse Lemerre, first published 1875
- Go to the text page.

This text was added to the website: 2025-06-15
Line count: 12
Word count: 98