Le voyageur s’arrête, et la cloche rustique

Aux derniers bruits du jour mêle de saints concerts.

A nocturne maybe, tinkling in the distance,

Or clinking glasses as the bistros fill.

Perhaps you looked out over this same view

Of the Vieux-Port, with George at your shoulder.

You’d only been together for a year:

Many still to come, not many happy.

I like to think you loved the bobbing barks

As much as I do on this autumn evening.

Some years before, Alphonse penned poems here.

Or maybe not. In any case, time’s swept

Away all words, the endless night

Persisting like a nocturne in the distance

Or glasses overflowing not with wine

But semiquavers tumbling over chords.