Old age./POEM

Ah! just the body, a bark worn down to the blade,
It grows old and crumbles, and sinks in fear;
The soul, its passenger, on the verge of no faith;
The soul does not perish, it proclaims everything aloud.

Oh my mother, home devoured by your flame,
how convinced he was of the eternal law
of our humanity, when I saw in you
the old age of the body, the youth of the soul!

Under your old years my eye found without wonder
The young feelings, I could feel the
sap of your heart boiling under your weak bark.

Outside inside still looking at you
I cried, I admired the mystery of the days:
The body in its weakness and the soul in its strength!