Flowers of Evil | Page 5

before me now, those eyes that shine,
No doubt inspired
by an Angel wise;
They stand, those God-like brothers that are mine,

And pour their diamond fires in mine eyes.
From all transgressions, from all snares, they save,
Towards the Path
of Joy they guide my ways;
They are my servants, and I am their
slave;
And all my soul, this living torch obeys.
Ye charming Eyes ye have those mystic beams,
Of candles, burning
in full day; the sun
Awakes, yet kills not their fantastic gleams;
Ye sing the Awak'ning, they the dark oblivion;
The Awak'ning of my
spirit ye proclaim,
O stars no sun can ever kill your flame!
The Spiritual Dawn
When the morning white and rosy breaks,
With the gnawing Ideal,
upon the debauchee,
By the power of a strange decree,
Within the
sotted beast an Angel wakes.
The mental Heaven's inaccessible blue,
For wearied mortals that still
dream and mourn,
Expands and sinks; towards the chasm drawn.

Thus, cherished goddess, Being pure and true
Upon the rests of foolish orgy-nights
Thine image, more sublime,

more pink, more clear,
Before my staring eyes is ever there.
The sun has darkened all the candle lights;
And thus thy spectre like
the immortal sun,
Is ever victorious thou resplendent one!
Evening Harmony
The hour approacheth, when, as their stems incline,
The flowers
evaporate like an incense urn,
And sounds and scents in the vesper
breezes turn;
A melancholy waltz and a drowsiness divine.
The flowers evaporate like an incense urn,
The viol vibrates like the
wailing of souls that repine.
A melancholy waltz and a drowsiness
divine,
The skies like a mosque are beautiful and stern.
The viol vibrates like the wailing of souls that repine;
Sweet souls
that shrink from chaos vast and etern,
The skies like a mosque are
beautiful and stern,
The sunset drowns within its blood-red brine.
Sweet souls that shrink from chaos vast and etern,
Essay the wreaths
of their faded Past to entwine,
The sunset drowns within its blood-red
brine,
Thy thought within me glows like an incense urn.
Overcast Sky
Meseemeth thy glance, soft enshrouded with dew,
Thy mysterious
eyes (are they grey, green or blue?),
Alternately cruel, and tender, and
shy,
Reflect both the languor and calm of the sky.
Thou recallest those white days with shadows caressed,
Engendering
tears from th' enraptured breast,
When racked by an anguish
unfathomed that weeps,
The nerves, too awake, jibe the spirit that
sleeps.
At times thou art like those horizons divine,
Where the suns of the

nebulous seasons decline;
How resplendent art thou O pasturage vast,

Illumed by the beams of a sky overcast!
O! dangerous dame oh seductive clime!
As well, will I love both thy
snow and thy rime,
And shall I know how from the frosts to entice

Delights that are keener than iron and ice?
Invitation to a Journey
My sister, my dear
Consider how fair,
Together to live it would be!
Down yonder to fly
To love, till we die,
In the land which resembles thee.
Those suns that rise
'Neath erratic skies,
No charm could be like unto theirs
So strange and divine,
Like those eyes of thine
Which glow in the midst of their tears.
There, all is order and loveliness,
Luxury, calm and voluptuousness.
The tables and chairs,
Polished bright by the years,
Would decorate sweetly our rooms,
And the rarest of flowers

Would twine round our bowers
And mingle their amber perfumes.
The ceilings arrayed,
And the mirrors inlaid,
This Eastern splendour among,

Would furtively steal
O'er our s&uls, and appeal
With its tranquillous native tongue.
There, all is order and loveliness,
Luxury, calm and voluptuousness.
In the harbours, peep,
At the vessels asleep
(Their humour is always to roam),
Yet it is but to grant
Thy smallest want
From the ends of the earth that they come,
The sunsets beam
Upon meadow and stream,
And upon the city entire
'Neath a violet crest,
The world sinks to rest,
Illumed by a golden fire.
There, all is order and loveliness,
Luxury, calm and voluptuousness.
Sisina
Imagine Diana in gorgeous array,
How into the forests and thickets
she flies,
With her hair in the breezes, and flushed for the fray,
How
the very best riders she proudly defies.
Have you seen Theroigne, of the blood-thirsty heart,
As an unshod
herd to attack he bestirs,
With cheeks all inflamed, playing up to his
part,
As he goes, sword in hand, up the royal stairs?
And so is Sisina yet this warrior sweet,
Has a soul with compassion
and kindness replete,
Inspired by drums and by powder, her sway

Knows how to concede to the supplicants' prayers,
And her bosom,
laid waste by the flames, has alway,
For those that are worthy, a
fountain of tears.
To a Creolean Lady
In a country perfumed with the sun's embrace,
I knew 'neath a dais of
purpled palms,
And branches where idleness weeps o'er one's face,

A Creolean lady of unknown charms.
Her tint, pale and warm this bewitching bride,
Displays a nobly
nurtured mien,
Courageous and grand like a huntsman, her stride;
A
tranquil smile and eyes serene.
If, madam, you'd go to the true land of gain,
By the banks of the
verdant Loire or the Seine,
How