Flowers of Evil | Page 6

worthy to garnish some pile of
renown.
You'd awake in the calm of some shadowy nest,
A thousand songs in
the poet's breast,
That your eyes would inspire far more than your
brown.
Moesta et Errabunda
Oh, Agatha, tell! does thy heart not at times fly away?
Far from the
city impure and the lowering sea,
To another ocean that blinds with
its dazzling array,
So blue and so clear and profound, like virginity?

Oh, Agatha, tell! does thy heart not at times fly away?
The sea, the vast ocean our travail and trouble consoles!
What demon
hath gifted the sea with a voice from on high,
To sing us (attuned to
an ^Eolus-organ that rolls
Forth a grumbling burden) a lenitive
lullabye?
The sea, the vast ocean our travail and trouble consoles!
Oh, carry me, waggons, oh, sailing-ships, help me depart!
Far, far,
here the dust is quite wet with our showering
tears,

Oh, say! it is true that Agatha's desolate heart,
Proclaimeth, " Away
from remorse, and from crimes, and
from cares,"
Oh, carry me,
waggons, oh, sailing ships, help me depart!
How distant you seem to be, perfumed Elysian fields!
Wherein there
is nothing but sunshine and love and glee;
Where all that one loves is
so worthy, and lovingly yields, And our hearts float about in the purest
of ecstasy,
How distant you seem to be, perfumed Elysian fields!
But the green paradise of those transient infantile loves,
The strolls,
and the songs, and the kisses, and bunches of
flowers,
The viols vibrating beyond, in the mountainous groves,
With the
chalice of wine and the evening, entwined, in the
bowers,
But the
green paradise of those transient infantile loves.
That innocent heaven o'erflowing with furtive delight,
Than China or
India, is it still further away?
Or, could one with pityful prayers bring it back to our
sight?
Or yet with a silvery voice o'er the ages convey
That innocent heaven
o'erflowing with furtive delight!
The Ghost
Just like an angel with evil eye,
I shall return to thee silently,
Upon
thy bower I'll alight,
With falling shadows of the night
With thee, my brownie, I'll commune,
And give thee kisses cold as
the moon,
And with a serpent's moist embrace,
I'll crawl around thy
resting-place.
And when the livid morning falls,
Thou'lt find alone the empty walls,

And till the evening, cold 'twill be.

As others with their tenderness,
Upon thy life and youthfulness,
I'll
reign alone with dread o'er thee.
Autumn Song
They ask me thy crystalline eyes, so acute,
"Odd lover why am I to
thee so dear?"
Be sweet and keep silent, my heart, wrifch is sear,

For all, save the rude and untutored brute,
Is loth its infernal depths to reveal,
And its dissolute motto engraven
with fire,
Oh charmer! whose arms endless slumber inspire!
I
abominate passion and wit makes me ill.
So let us love gently. Within his retreat,
Foreboding, Love seeks for
his arrows a prey,
I know all the arms of his battle array.
Delirium and loathing O pale Marguerite!
Like me, art thou not an
autumnal ray,
Alas my so white, my so cold Marguerite!
Sadness of the Moon-Goddess
To-night the Moon dreams with increased weariness,
Like a beauty
stretched forth on a downy heap
Of rugs, while her languorous
fingers caress
The contour of her breasts, before falling to sleep.
On the satin back of the avalanche soft,
She falls into lingering
swoons, as she dies,
While she lifteth her eyes to white visions aloft,

Which like efflorescence float up to the skies.
When at times, in her languor, down on to this sphere,
She slyly lets
trickle a furtive tear,
A poet, desiring slumber to shun,
Takes up this pale tear in the palm of his hand
(The colours of which
like an opal blend),
And buries it far from the eyes of the sun.
Cats

All ardent lovers and all sages prize,
As ripening years incline upon
their brows
The mild and mighty cats pride of the house
That like
unto them are indolent, stern and wise.
The^friends of Learning and of Ecstasy,
They search for silence and
the horrors of gloom;
The^devil had used them for his steeds of
Doom,
Could he alone have bent their pride to slavery.
When musing, they display those outlines chaste,
Of the great
sphinxes stretched o'er the sandy waste,
That seem to slumber deep in
a dream without end :
From out their loins a fountainous furnace flies,
And grains of
sparkling gold, as fine as sand,
Bestar the mystic pupils of their eyes.
Owls
Beneath the shades of sombre yews,
The silent owls sit ranged in
rows,
Like ancient idols, strangely pose,
And darting fiery eyes,
they muse.
Immovable, they sit and gaze,
Until the melancholy hour,
At which
the darknesses devour
The faded sunset's slanting rays.
Their attitude, instructs the wise,
That he within this world who flies

From tumult and from merriment;
The man allured by a passing face,
For ever bears the chastisement
Of having wished to change his place.
Music
Oft Music possesses me like the seas!

To my planet pale,
'Neath a ceiling of mist, in the lofty breeze,
I set my sail.
With inflated lungs and expanded chest,
Like