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Within the dwindling glow of light from languid lamps,
Sunk in the softest cushions soaked with heady scent,
Hippolyta lay dreaming of the thrilling touch
That spread apart the veil of her young innocence.
She searched with troubled eye, afflicted by the storm,
For the once-distant sky of her naivety,
A voyager who turns and looks beyond the wake
To blue horizons which had once been overhead.
The heavy tears that fell from dull and weary eyes,
The broken look, the stupor, the voluptuousness,
Her conquered arms thrown down, surrendered in the field,
All strangely served her still, to show her fragile charm.
Stretched calmly at her feet, joyfully satisfied,
Delphine looked up at her with those compelling eyes
Like a strong animal that oversees her prey,
First having taken care to mark it with her teeth.
Strong beauty on her knees before frail beauty's couch,
Superb, luxurious, she breathed completely in
The wine of triumph, and she stretched out towards her love
As if to gather in a kiss of recompense.
She looked within the eye of that pale conquered soul
For silent canticles, chanting of love's delight
And of that gratitude, sublime and infinite,
Which from the eyelids spreads like a soft-breathing sigh.
- 'Hippolyta, dear heart, what do you have to say?
Now do you understand you do not need to give
The sacred offering of roses of your youth
To one who'd wither them with his tempestuous breath?
My kisses are as light as mayflies on the wing
Caressing in the dusk the great transparent lakes.
But those your lover gives dig out their cruel ruts
Like chariots, or like the farmer's biting plough;
They pass across you like a heavy, coupled team -
Pitiless horses' tread, or oxen's brutal hooves...
Sister Hippolyta! then turn your face to me.
My darling, heart and soul, my better self, my all,
