Meditation
by Charles Baudelaire
Calm down, my Sorrow, we must move with care.
You called for evening; it descends, it's here.
The town is coffined in its atmosphere,
bringing relief to some, to others care.
Now while the common multitude strips bare,
feels pleasure's cat o' nine tails on its back,
and fights off anguish at the great bazaar,
give me your hand, my Sorrow. Let's stand back;
back from these people! Look, the dead years dressed
in old clothes crowd the balconies of the sky.
Regret emerges smiling from the sea,
the sick sun slumbers underneath an arch,
and like a shroud strung out from east to west,
listen, my Dearest, hear the sweet night march!
The Fountain
by Charles Baudelaire
Stay one moment as you are
In the tired pose where pleasure
Touched you, closing your sad stare,
Leaving you innocent, gay and pure.
In the courtyard the perpetual fountain
Ruminates nightly and daily;
Its whisper prolongs the ecstasy
Which you and the evening have given.
The fountain's lifted sheaf
Of wavering flowers
Where moonlight darts as if
To disclose all its colours
Falls in a wide scarf
Of shining tears.
So your secret soul, summoned
By the electric touch of pleasure,
Springs, confident of its end,
To the huge sky's mysterious lure;
Then pauses, hesitates, expands
In a wide reluctant shower
Which inevitably descends
To where my heart hides for its hour.
The fountain's lifted sheaf
Of wavering flowers
Where moonlight darts as if
To disclose all its colours
Falls in a wide scarf
Of shining tears.
Oh you whom the dark brightens, my heart
Swaying between your breasts, listens
To that other heart whose beat
Is heard incessantly in the fountain's.
Musical water, moon, trees
Whose shiver surrounds the dark shine
Of night opening into mysteries,
Your sad clarity mirrors mine.
The fountain's lifted sheaf
Of wavering flowers
Where moonlight darts as if
To disclose all its colours
Falls in a wide scarf
Of shining tears.
To a Creole Lady
by Charles Baudelaire
I've known, in scented lands that suns caress,
Under a canopy of reddened trees,
Where palms deluge the eyes with laziness,
A Creole lady's charms that no one sees.
Pale-hued and warm, this brown-skinned sorceress
Bears in her head fine airs and dignities;
A huntress strides in her tall slenderness,
And her smile's quiet and her gaze at ease.
If ever you go where true glories are,
Madame, beside the Seine or the green Loire,
Your beauty our old houses might well prize,
And in some sheltered shady haunt you'd start
A thousand sonnets in each poet's heart,
Subdued more than your slaves by your large eyes.
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Please allow me to make a humble homage to the French Nation through the display of a sample of the work of one of the greatest poets EVER, Monsieur CHARLES BAUDELAIRE, along with ARTHUR RIMBAUD, ANTONIN ARTAUD, APOLLINAIRE, MALLARMÉ are the Parnassus of Poetry "par excellence".
Thanks for the Revolution, for piercing in our conscience LIBERTY, EQUALITY & FRATERNITY.
Ooooh The Fountain is absolutely spectacular...what awesome poetry, actually more like a piece of art.
ReplyDeleteI love coming here Songo...there's always something unique and not often heard of.
"The fountain's lifted sheaf
ReplyDeleteOf wavering flowers
Where moonlight darts as if
To disclose all its colours
Falls in a wide scarf
Of shining tears."
What an image Janice, eh?
Yeah Monsieur BAUDELAIRE is a SENIOR, BIGGER, MASTER POET, immortal, a source of water from which all of us Apprentices of Wizard must drink of.
I love your comm´s
Hugs