Back to home page Back to "Occasional Papers" This sonnet offers
the reader many opposites involved in each other; peace and
worry are brought together by the obscure atmosphere of the
evening. In evening itself one cannot tell the day from night.
The two quatrains present two opposite situations of which one
and the same universal may be abstracted. The universal is
benumbing of the senses, the oblivion of the world. The first
situation suggests retreat for contemplation, self-dedication to
obscure atmosphere, to nothingness. The second one seeks remedy
in vulgarity, surfeit of senses, lust. Although these two modes
occur one after the other, the conjunction "pendant que"
suggests that they should be conceived of as simultaneous,
contrapuntal; the main clause of line 8 follows directly from
the first quatrain. The title itself "Recueillement" implies a
spiritual and a physical act: (1) retreat, religious meditation,
contemplation; (2) collecting, harvest. As for the first sense,
the clue for the first quatra