C.D. Warner, et al., comp. The Library of the World’s Best Literature.
An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.

Odelette I

By Henri de Régnier (1864–1936)

A LITTLE reed has sufficed me to make the tall grass rustle, and the whole meadow, and the gentle willows, and the singing brook as well; a little reed has sufficed me to make the forest sing.

Those who pass have heard it in the depths of the evening, in their thoughts, in the silence and in the wind, clear or lost, near or far…. Those who pass listening to their thoughts in the depths of themselves will hear it still, and hear it always singing.

It has sufficed me, this little reed gathered at the spring where Love comes sometimes to mirror his grave, weeping face, to make those who pass weep, and to make the grass tremble and the water rustle, and I have made the whole forest sing in the breath of a reed.

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