Works

I.

Race of Abel, sleep and eat;
God smiles on you complacently.

Race of Cain, in mud and filth
You crawl and die in misery.

Abel's race, your sacrifice...

Remember, my love, the object we saw
That beautiful morning in June:
By a bend in the path a carcass reclined
On a bed sown with pebbles and stones;

Her legs were spread out like a lecherous whore,...

My soul, do you remember the object we saw
on what was a fine summer's day:
at the path's far corner, a shameful corpse
on the gravel-bed, darkly lay,

legs in the air, like a lecherous woman,...

Alone at last! Nothing is to be heard but the rattle of a few tardy and tired-out cabs. There will be silence now, if not repose, for several hours at least....

My heart was like a bird that fluttered joyously
And glided free among the tackle and the lines!
The vessel rolled along under a cloudless sky
An angel, tipsy, gay, full of the radiant sun.
...

Have patience, O my sorrow, and be still.
You asked for night: it falls: it is here.
A shadowy atmosphere enshrouds the hill,
to some men bringing peace, to others care.

While the vile human multitude...

Stiff scholars and the hody amorous
Will in their ripeness equally admire
Powerful, gende cats, pride of the house,
Who, like them, love to sit around the fire.

Friends both of sciences and of l'amour,...

Sous un grand ciel gris, dans une grande plaine poudreuse, sans
chemins, sans gazon, sans un chardon, sans une ortie, je rencontrai
plusieurs hommes qui marchaient courb's.
...

I

Bient't nous plongerons dans les froides t'n'bres;
Adieu vive clart' de nos 't's trop courts!
J'entends d'j' tomber avec des chocs fun'bres
Le bois retentissant sur le pav' des cours.
...

One would say your gaze was a misted screen:
your strange eyes (are they blue, grey or green?)
changeable, tender, dreamy, cruel, and again
echoing the indolence and pallor of heaven.
...

The Devil and I had a chat
This morning in my snuggery;
Trying to catch me in a lapse,
'Tell me', he said beseechingly,

'Among the many charming things
Of which her body is composed...

Like pensive cattle lying on the sands
They gaze upon the endless seas, until
Feet grope for feet, and hands close over hands,
In languid sweetness or with quivering chill.
...

Within the dwindling glow of light from languid lamps,
Sunk in the softest cushions soaked with heady scent,
Hippolyta lay dreaming of the thrilling touch
That spread apart the veil of her young innocence.
...

Once, once only, sweet and lovable woman,
you leant your smooth arm on mine
(that memory has never faded a moment
from the shadowy depths of my mind):


it was late: the full moon spread its light...

Une fois, une seule, aimable et douce femme,
A mon bras votre bras poli
S'appuya (sur le fond t'n'breux de mon 'me
Ce souvenir n'est point p'li);

Il 'tait tard ; ainsi qu'une m'daille neuve...

From this bizarre and livid sky
Tormented by your destiny,
Into your vacant spirit fly
What tho~ghts? respond, you libertine.

Voracious in my appetite
For the uncertain and unknown,...

Hou, O my Grief, be wise and tranquil still,
The eve is thine which even now drops down,
To carry peace or care to human will,
And in a misty veil enfolds the town.
...

You are a pink and lovely autumn sky!
But sadness in me rises like the sea,
And leaves in ebbing only bitter clay
On my sad lip, the smart of memory.

Your hand slides up my fainting breast at will;...

In Nature's temple living pillars rise,
And words are murmured none have understood,
And man must wander through a tangled wood
Of symbols watching him with friendly eyes.
...

I beg your pity, You, my only love;
My fallen heart lies in a deep abyss,
A universe of leaden heaviness,
Where cursing terrors swim the night above!

For six months stands a sun with heatless beams,...