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Read Ebook: The Three Hills and Other Poems by Baudelaire Charles Squire John Collings Sir
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TWELVE TRANSLATIONS FROM C. BAUDELAIRE
TOUT ENTI?RE THE ALCHEMY OF GRIEF SPLEEN A VOYAGE TO CYTHERA THE CRACKED BELL THE OFFENDED MOON TO THEODORE BANVILLE, 1842 MUSIC THE CATS THE SADNESS OF THE MOON MOESTA ET ERRABUNDA THE OWLS
Many of the above poems have appeared in the "British Review," the "Eye-Witness," the "New Witness," the "Oxford and Cambridge Review," the "New Statesman," and the "New Age," to the Editors of which thanks are due for permission to reprint. Three of the short poems and most of the translations are extracted from an earlier volume.
ANTINOMIES ON A RAILWAY STATION
As I stand waiting in the rain For the foggy hoot of the London train, Gazing at silent wall and lamp And post and rail and platform damp, What is this power that comes to my sight That I see a night without the night, That I see them clear, yet look them through, The silvery things and the darkly blue, That the solid wall seems soft as death, A wavering and unanchored wraith, And rails that shine and stones that stream Unsubstantial as a dream? What sudden door has opened so, What hand has passed, that I should know This moving vision not of trance That melts the globe of circumstance, This sight that marks not least or most And makes a stone a passing ghost?
Is it that a year ago I stood upon this self-same spot; Is it that since a year ago The place and I have altered not; Is it that I half forgot, A year ago, and all despised For a space the things that I had prized: The race of life, the glittering show? Is it that now a year has passed Of vain pursuit of glittering things, Of fruitless searching, shouting, running, And greedy lies and candour cunning, Here as I stand the year above Sudden the heats and the strivings fail And fall away, a fluctuant veil, And the fixed familiar stones restore The old appearance-buried core, The moveless and essential me, The eternal personality Alone enduring first and last?
No, this I have known in other ways, In other places, other days. Not only here, on this one peak, Do fixity and beauty speak Of the delusiveness of change, Of the transparency of form, The bootless stress of minds that range, The awful calm behind the storm. In many places, many days, The invaded soul receives the rays Of countries she was nurtured in, Speaks in her silent language strange To that beyond which is her kin. Even in peopled streets at times A metaphysic arm is thrust Through the partitioning fabric thin, And tears away the darkening pall Cast by the bright phenomenal, And clears the obscured spirit's mirror From shadows of deceptive error, And shows the bells and all their ringing, And all the crowds and all their singing, Carillons that are nothing's chimes And dust that is not even dust.... But rarely hold I converse thus Where shapes are bright and clamorous, More often comes the word divine In places motionless and far; Beneath the white peculiar shine Of sunless summer afternoons; At eventide on pale lagoons Where hangs reflected one pale star; Or deep in the green solitudes Of still erect entranc?d woods.
O, in the woods alone lying, Scarce a bough in the wind sighing, Gaze I long with fervid power At leaf and branch and grass and flower, Breathe I breaths of trembling sight Shed from great urns of green delight, Take I draughts and drink them up Poured from many a stalk and cup. Now do I burn for nothing more Than thus to gaze, thus to adore This exquisiteness of nature ever In silence....
But with instant light Rends the film; with joy I quiver To see with new celestial sight Flower and leaf and grass and tree, Doomed barks on an eternal sea, Flit phantom-like as transient smoke. Beauty herself her spell has broke, Beauty, the herald and the lure, Her message told, may not endure; Her portal opened, she has died, Supreme immortal suicide. Yes, sleepless nature soundless flings Invisible grapples round the soul, Drawing her through the web of things To the primal end of her journeyings, Her ultimate and constant pole.
For Beauty with her hands that beckon Is but the Prophet of a Higher, A flaming and ephemeral beacon, A Phoenix perishing by fire. Herself from us herself estranges, Herself her mighty tale doth kill, That all things change yet nothing changes, That all things move yet all are still.
I cannot sink, I cannot climb, Now that I see my ancient dwelling, The central orb untouched of time, And taste a peace all bliss excelling. Now I have broken Beauty's wall, Now that my kindred world I hold, I care not though the cities fall And the green earth go cold.
THE THREE HILLS
There were three hills that stood alone With woods about their feet. They dreamed quiet when the sun shone And whispered when the rain beat.
They wore all three their coronals Till men with houses came And scored their heads with pits and walls And thought the hills were tame.
Red and white when day shines bright They hide the green for miles, Where are the old hills gone? At night The moon looks down and smiles.
She sees the captors small and weak, She knows the prisoners strong, She hears the patient hills that speak: "Brothers, it is not long;
"Brothers, we stood when they were not Ten thousand summers past. Brothers, when they are clean forgot We shall outlive the last;
"One shall die and one shall flee With terror in his train, And earth shall eat the stones, and we Shall be alone again."
A CHANT
Gently the petals fall as the tree gently sways That has known many springs and many petals fall Year after year to strew the green deserted ways And the statue and the pond and the low, broken wall.
Faded is the memory of old things done, Peace floats on the ruins of ancient festival; They lie and forget in the warmth of the sun, And a sky silver-blue arches over all.
O softly, O tenderly, the heart now stirs With desires faint and formless; and, seeking not, I find Quiet thoughts that flash like azure king-fishers Across the luminous tranquil mirror of the mind.
ARTEMIS ALTERA
O full of candour and compassion, Whom love and worship both would praise, Love cannot frame nor worship fashion The image of your fearless ways!
How show your noble brow's dark pallor, Your chivalrous casque of ebon hair, Your eyes' bright strength, your lips' soft valour, Your supple shoulders and hands that dare?
Our souls when na?vely you examine, Your sword of innocence, flaming, huge, Sweeps over us, and there is famine Within the ports of subterfuge.
You hate contempt and love not laughter; With your sharp spear of virgin will You harry the wicked strong; but after, O huntress who could never kill,
Should they be trodden down or pierced, Swift, swift, you fly with burning cheek To place your beauty's shield reversed Above the vile defenceless weak!
STARLIGHT
Last night I lay in an open field And looked at the stars with lips sealed; No noise moved the windless air, And I looked at the stars with steady stare.
There were some that glittered and some that shone With a soft and equal glow, and one That queened it over the sprinkled round, Swaying the host with silent sound.
"Calm things," I thought, "in your cavern blue, I will learn and hold and master you; I will yoke and scorn you as I can, For the pride of my heart is the pride of a man."
Grass to my cheek in the dewy field I lay quite still with lips sealed, And the pride of a man and his rigid gaze Stalked like swords on heaven's ways.
But through a sudden gate there stole The Universe and spread in my soul; Quick went my breath and quick my heart, And I looked at the stars with lips apart.
FLORIAN'S SONG
My soul, it shall not take us, O we will escape This world that strives to break us And cast us to its shape; Its chisel shall not enter, Its fire shall not touch, Hard from rim to centre, We will not crack or smutch.
'Gainst words sweet and flowered We have an amulet, We will not play the coward For any black threat; If we but give endurance To what is now within-- The single assurance That it is good to win.
Slaves think it better To be weak than strong, Whose hate is a fetter And their love a thong. But we will view those others With eyes like stone, And if we have no brothers We will walk alone.
DIALOGUE
THE ONE
The dead man's gone, the live man's sad, the dying leaf shakes on the tree, The wind constrains the window panes and moans like moaning of the sea, And sour's the taste now culled in haste of lovely things I won too late, And loud and loud above the crowd the Voice of One more strong than we.
THE OTHER
This Voice you hear, this call you fear, is it unprophesied or new? Were you so insolent to think its rope would never circle you? Did you then beastlike live and walk with ears and eyes that would not turn? Who bade you hope your service 'scape in that eternal retinue?
THE ONE
No; for I swear now bare's the tree and loud the moaning of the wind, I walked no rut with eyelids shut, my ears and eyes were never blind, Only my eager thoughts I bent on many things that I desired To make my greedy heart content ere flesh and blood I left behind.
THE OTHER
Ignorance, then, was all your fault and film?d eyes that could not know, That half discerned and never learned the temporal way that men must go; You set the image of the world high for your heart's idolatry, Though with your lips you called the world a toy, a ghost, a passing show.
THE ONE
No, no; this is not true; my lips spoke only what my heart believed. Called I the world a toy; I spoke not echo-like or self-deceived. But that I thought the toy was mine to play with, and the passing show Would sate at least my passing lusts, and did not, therefore am I grieved.
What did I do that I must bear this lifelong tyranny of my fate, That I must writhe in bonds unsought of accidental love and hate? Had chance but join?d different dice, but once or twice, but once or twice, All lovely things that I desired I should have held before too late.
Surely I knew that flesh was grass nor valued overmuch the prize, But all the powers of chance conspired to cheat a man both just and wise. Happy I'd been had I but had my due reward, and not a sword Flaming in diabolic hand between me and my Paradise.
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