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by Victor Hugo (1802 - 1885)

Tu souris dans l'invisible
Language: French (Français) 
Tu souris dans l'invisible.
Ô douce âme inaccessible,
Seul, morne, amer,
Je sens ta robe qui flotte
Tandis qu'à mes pieds sanglote
La sombre mer.

La nuit à mes chants assiste.
Je chante mon refrain triste
À l'horizon.
Ange frissonnant, tu mêles
Le battement de tes ailes
À ma chanson.

Je songe à ces pauvres êtres,
Nés sous tous ces toits champêtres,
Dont le feu luit,
Barbe grise, tête blonde,
Qu'emporta cette eau profonde
Dans l'âpre nuit.

Je pleure les morts des autres.
Hélas ! Leurs deuils et les nôtres
Ne sont qu'un deuil.
Nous sommes, dans l'étendue,
La même barque perdue
Au même écueil.

Available sung texts:   ← What is this?

•   N. Lee 

N. Lee sets stanza 2

About the headline (FAQ)

Text Authorship:

  • by Victor Hugo (1802 - 1885), no title, written 1854, appears in Les quatre vents de l'esprit, in 3. Le Livre Lyrique -- La Destinée, in 19. Sur la falaise, no. 1 [author's text checked 1 time 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 Noël Lee (1924 - 2013), "La nuit", stanza 2 [ voice and piano ] [sung text checked 1 time]

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website: 2010-04-03
Line count: 24
Word count: 104

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