Manuscript, “Etching, from the French of Maurice de Mauny”

Transcription of Gibson’s “Etching.” The quotation used in exhibition label is in BOLD. 

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         Par 

From the French Etching.                  Maurice du Mauny. 

of Maurice du Mauny .          Translated by Charles H. Gibson Jr. 

by Charles H. Gibson, Jr. 

Is it heaven, or is it earth?  Truly it is heaven when / I gaze into thy dear eyes – A heaven of that deep blue / that is so like the sea; and your eyes, as dark, seem to / take the colors of the things that roll beneath its depths. / Be it sea or sky, my being loses itself in them and seems to escape / from its mortal frame. 

If I could only read, there in that deep blue, all / that you thou seest in me? Ah! what happiness!  for it would / be thee – 

And yet it is the earth – four walls, a room; / but even as I look at thee my sight is dimmed and / the walls fade away and disappear, giving plea to the / heaven of your eyes.  Speak not.  One word could destroy / my ideal that even now has become a heavenly reality.  You know / that I love you; and what if you did not love me?  The / shortest silence now outweighs in eloquence the greatest speech / – speak not, – and let me live in the heaven of thine eyes /  –  Is it true? Is it possible? No it cannot be – and yet / a flash of lightning from thine eyes lights up the darkness: It / says – what does it say? – “I love you” – 

Another flash of lightning – but not from you this time.  / It comes from without.  It tears the very elements and / from afar the thunder follows close upon it. It lightnings it 

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thunders; the storm approaches – it is here – the rain and / the hail beat against the window-panes in large [drops?] that are as heavy as lead, / crush[ing?] down the wheat like so many bullets. /  The pregnant tops bend beneath their load so that the ripened seeds are / shaken down by the rain over the ground.  So are earthly / harvests blighted by rain from the clouds! But my / heaven knows no clouds – you love me. 

The four walls are alive with flames of light – / the lightning and the thunder rage without – the storm / resounds on all around. But my sky is without a / cloud.  Fight on now angry elements, fight on!  Here / is a peace that naught disturb….. / 

And do you dear one do you remember that first kiss, sealed by the thunderbolt?