LAURENT METTRAUX
Route Principale 160, CH-1791 Courtaman (Switzerland),
tel. + fax: (+41)
26/684.18.65, E-mail : laurent.mettraux@bluewin.ch
Welcome ¦ Biography
¦ Principal
works ¦ Catalogue of works
Documents
to download ¦ Score
excerpts ¦ Audio
excerpts
CDs
¦ Critics and articles ¦ (First) performances ¦ Texts
¦ Links
Plus
près de toi que tu ne l’es toi-même
(Closer to you than you are yourself)
Presentation,
audio recording and score excerpts
Exalted, celebrated,
glorified, magnified from all Eternity !
O You, have mercy
upon us in your great mercifulness !
O You, Master of our
strength, Rock of our shelter,
Shield of our
salvation, You protect us !
You have arranged
the rays of the sun and fixed the stars.
Every being, every thing,
sings to your almightiness !
O You who is
eternal, You love us of an infinite love.
O You who is Wisdom,
You have for us an immense and excessive tenderness.
Love is the Name
which is given Him…
No other Name is
more suitable for Him,
So precious is love,
So beautiful is
love.
He does nothing but
loving.
The Merciful One
sustains all those that fall,
The Sympathetic One
straightens all those that are bended,
He satisfies as one
could wish everything that has life.
There is no hunger,
there is no thirst for the one having confidence in Him.
He
listens to the one that suffers adversity,
His heart
is compassionate for the one that calls upon Him…
You are
my companion ;
Where
ever my path goes,
You hold
my hand and guide me.
You are
my only sustainer,
Ceaselessly
on my side, carrying my yoke
On the
road where I walk along…
When I
loose my way while walking,
You make
me find again the Way,
You
encourage me and convince me to go further.
And now,
I am penetrated and surrounded by Your joy.
Each moment,
each day are blessed.
You
penetrate each moment of my life,
You
transform my hopes and my occupations…
Your
love, without cease, fills my heart.
Here is
the One coming to enlighten the world
To
appease the multitudes
And to
offer them happiness and support.
Here is
the One that has an infinitely more greater love
Then the
love of a father and a mother for their child,
The One
that loves without discrimination
And
embraces with His compassion all living beings.
My
delights surpass
For you
all other delights…
The
pleasures I give you
Surpass
all other pleasures…
I am the
Beauty, am I the Grace,
Love me,
my Beloved,
Love me…
No one is
closer to you than Me.
While the
others love you
In order
to love themselves through you,
Myself, I
love you for yourself.
If you
get close to Me,
It’s
because I’ve come to you…
I am
closer to you than you are yourself,
Closer to
you than your soul,
Closer to
you than your breath…
Laurent Mettraux
The texts used are
taken from the Yotser (Jewish blessing from the VIII. Century, after Isaiah
45:7), from the Ahava (other Jewish blessing), from the Cherubinischer
Wandersmann by Angelus Silesius, from Psalm 145, from the Gospel according to
the tradition of John, from the great Hymn to the Sun (written at the time of
Amenemhat II), from two poems by Toukaram, from the Ekottarâgamasûtra, the
Great Sûtra of Infinite Life (Dai-Muryojukyo), the Sûtra of the Contemplation
of Infinite Life (Kan-Muryojukyo), and from a mystical poem by Ibn ’Arabi.