Poemquotes 22: From Baudelaire's "Spleen and Ideal"

 (my translations)

 

XXXIX.

I give you these verses so that if my name

Happily reaches distant epochs,

And one evening sets human brains dreaming,

Vessel driven on by a great aquilon,

Your memory, same as uncertain fables,

Fatigues the reader like a rhythmic drone,

And like a fraternal and mystical chain

Remains as though suspended from my lofty rhymes;

Accursed being, to whom, from the deep abyss

To the heights of heaven, nothing, save myself, corresponds!

— Oh you who, like a shadow with ephemeral trace,

Tread by a light foot and serene regard

The stupid mortals who deemed you bitter;

Jade-eyed statue, great bronze-browed angel! •

XL.

Semper Eadem

"Whence do you come," said you, "this strange sadness

Rising like the sea over the dark and naked rock?"

—When our heart once made its harvest,

Living is a sickness. It's a secret known to all,

A pain very-simple and unmysterious,

And, like your joy, astounding for everyone.

So cease searching, o beautiful curious one!

And, though your voice be sweet, silence yourself!

Silence yourself, ignorant one! ever delighted soul!

Mouth with childlike laugh! Still more than Life,

Death often keeps hold of us through subtle bonds.

Let, let my heart intoxicate itself through a lie,

Plunge in your fair eyes as within a fair dream

And slumber long in the shadow of your eyelashes! •

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