Homepage
Login
Profile
BookClubs
dmBox
Read Ebook: The Flowers of Evil by Baudelaire Charles Scott Cyril Translator
Font size:
Background color:
Text color:
Add to tbrJar First Page Next Page Prev Page
Ebook has 301 lines and 13880 words, and 7 pages
Interior Life
A long while I dwelt beneath vast porticoes, While the ocean-suns bathed with a thousand fires, And which with their great and majestic spires, At eventide looked like basaltic grottoes.
The billows, in rolling depictured the skies, And mingled, in solemn and mystical strain, The all-mighteous chords of their luscious refrain With the sun-set's colours reflexed in mine eyes.
It is there that I lived in exalted calm, In the midst of the azure, the splendour, the waves, While pregnant with perfumes, naked slaves
Refreshed my forehead with branches of palm, Whose gentle and only care was to know The secret that caused me to languish so.
Man and the Sea
Free man! the sea is to thee ever dear! The sea is thy mirror, thou regardest thy soul In its mighteous waves that unendingly roll, And thy spirit is yet not a chasm less drear.
Thou delight'st to plunge deep in thine image down; Thou tak'st it with eyes and with arms in embrace, And at times thine own inward voice would'st efface With the sound of its savage ungovernable moan.
You are both of you, sombre, secretive and deep: Oh mortal, thy depths are foraye unexplored, Oh sea--no one knoweth thy dazzling hoard, You both are so jealous your secrets to keep!
And endless ages have wandered by, Yet still without pity or mercy you fight, So mighty in plunder and death your delight: Oh wrestlers! so constant in enmity!
Beauty
I am lovely, O mortals, like a dream of stone, And my bosom, where each one gets bruised in turn, To inspire the love of a poet is prone, Like matter eternally silent and stern.
As an unfathomed sphinx, enthroned by the Nile, My heart a swan's whiteness with granite combines, And I hate every movement, displacing the lines, And never I weep and never I smile.
The poets in front of mine attitudes fine , To studies profound all their moments assign,
For I have all these docile swains to enchant-- Two mirrors, which Beauty in all things ignite: Mine eyes, my large eyes, of eternal Light!
The Ideal
It could ne'er be those beauties of ivory vignettes; The varied display of a worthless age, Nor puppet-like figures with castonets, That ever an heart like mine could engage.
I leave to Gavarni, that poet of chlorosis, His hospital-beauties in troups that whirl, For I cannot discover amid his pale roses A flower to resemble my scarlet ideal.
Since, what for this fathomless heart I require Is--Lady Macbeth you! in crime so dire; --An AEschylus dream transposed from the South--
Or thee, oh great "Night" of Michael-Angelo born, Who so calmly thy limbs in strange posture hath drawn, Whose allurements are framed for a Titan's mouth.
The Giantess
I should have loved--erewhile when Heaven conceived Each day, some child abnormal and obscene, Beside a maiden giantess to have lived, Like a luxurious cat at the feet of a queen;
To see her body flowering with her soul, And grow, unchained, in awe-inspiring art, Within the mists across her eyes that stole To divine the fires entombed within her heart.
And oft to scramble o'er her mighty limbs, And climb the slopes of her enormous knees, Or in summer when the scorching sunlight streams
Across the country, to recline at ease, And slumber in the shadow of her breast Like an hamlet 'neath the mountain-crest.
Hymn to Beauty
O Beauty! dost thou generate from Heaven or from Hell? Within thy glance, so diabolic and divine, Confusedly both wickedness and goodness dwell, And hence one might compare thee unto sparkling wine.
Thy look containeth both the dawn and sunset stars, Thy perfumes, as upon a sultry night exhale, Thy kiss a philter, and thy mouth a Grecian vase, That renders heroes cowardly and infants hale.
Yea, art thou from the planets, or the fiery womb? The demon follows in thy train, with magic fraught, Thou scatter'st seeds haphazardly of joy and doom, Thou govern'st everything, but answer'st unto nought.
O Loveliness! thou spurnest corpses with delight, Among thy jewels, Horror hath such charms for thee, And Murder 'mid thy mostly cherished trinklets bright, Upon thy massive bosom dances amorously.
The blinded, fluttering moth towards the candle flies, Then frizzles, falls, and falters--"Blessings unto thee"-- The panting swain that o'er his beauteous mistress sighs, Seems like the Sick, that stroke their gravestones lovingly.
What matter, if thou comest from the Heavens or Hell, O Beauty, frightful ghoul, ingenuous and obscure! So long thine eyes, thy smile, to me the way can tell Towards that Infinite I love, but never saw.
From God or Satan? Angel, Mermaid, Proserpine? What matter if thou makest--blithe, voluptuous sprite-- With rhythms, perfumes, visions--O mine only queen!-- The universe less hideous and the hours less trite.
Exotic Perfume
When, with closed eyes, on a hot afternoon, The scent of thine ardent breast I inhale, Celestial vistas my spirit assail; Caressed by the flames of an endless sun.
A langorous island, where Nature abounds With exotic trees and luscious fruit; And with men whose bodies are slim and astute, And with women whose frankness delights and astounds.
While the tamarisk-odours that dreamily throng The air, round my slumberous senses intwine, And mix, in my soul, with the mariners' song.
La Chevelure
O fleece, that foams down unto the shoulders bare! O curls, O scents which lovely languidness exhale! Delight! to fill this alcove's sombre atmosphere With memories, sleeping deep within this tress of hair, I'll wave it in the evening breezes like a veil!
The shores of Africa, and Asia's burning skies, A world forgotten, distant, nearly dead and spent, Within thy depths, O aromatic forest! lies. And like to spirits floating unto melodies, Mine own, Belov?d! glides within thy sacred scent.
There I will hasten, where the trees and humankind With languor lull beside the hot and silent sea; Strong tresses bear me, be to me the waves and wind! Within thy fragrance lies a dazzling dream confined Of sails and masts and flames--O lake of ebony!
A loudly echoing harbour, where my soul may hold To quaff, the silver cup of colours, scents and sounds, Wherein the vessels glide upon a sea of gold, And stretch their mighty arms, the glory to enfold Of virgin skies, where never-ending heat abounds.
I'll plunge my brow, enamoured with voluptuousness Within this darkling ocean of infinitude, Until my subtle spirit, which thy waves caress, Shall find you once again, O fertile weariness; Unending lullabye of perfumed lassitude!
Ye tresses blue--recess of strange and sombre shades, Ye make the azure of the starry Realm immense; Upon the downy beeches, by your curls' cascades, Among your mingling fragrances, my spirit wades To cull the musk and cocoa-nut and lotus scents.
Long--foraye--my hand, within thy heavy mane, Shall scatter rubies, pearls, sapphires eternally, And thus my soul's desire for thee shall never wane; For art not thou the oasis where I dream and drain With draughts profound, the golden wine of memory?
With pearly robes that wave within the wind, Even when she walks, she seems to dance, Like swaying serpents round those wands entwined Which fakirs ware in rhythmic elegance.
So like the desert's Blue, and the sands remote, Both, deaf to mortal suffering and to strife, Or like the sea-weeds 'neath the waves that float, Indifferently she moulds her budding life.
Her polished eyes are made of minerals bright, And in her mien, symbolical and cold, Wherein an angel mingles with a sphinx of old,
Where all is gold, and steel, and gems, and light, There shines, just like a useless star eternally, The sterile woman's frigid majesty.
Posthumous Remorse
Ah, when thou shalt slumber, my darkling love, Beneath a black marble-made statuette, And when thou'lt have nought for thy house or alcove, But a cavernous den and a damp oubliette.
Add to tbrJar First Page Next Page Prev Page