Live a poetic existence. Take responsibility for the air you breathe and never forget that the highest appreciation is not to just utter words, but to live them compassionately.

Saturday, October 2, 2010

A Poem: "Autumn" by Charles Baudelaire


I adore autumn; to come across a poem that is rejecting the beauty of this seasonal transition was rather shocking. However, it was a refreshingly lovely detour from the typical romantic poetry that is always in awe of the fall.

Autumn

By Charles Baudelaire

Soon we will plunge ourselves into cold shadows,
And all of summer's stunning afternoons will be gone.
I already hear the dead thuds of logs below
Falling on the cobblestones and the lawn.

All of winter will return to me:
derision, Hate, shuddering, horror, drudgery and vice,
And exiled, like the sun, to a polar prison,
My soul will harden into a block of red ice.

I shiver as I listen to each log crash and slam:
The echoes are as dull as executioners' drums.
My mind is like a tower that slowly succumbs
To the blows of a relentless battering ram.

It seems to me, swaying to these shocks, that someone
Is nailing down a coffin in a hurry somewhere.
For whom? -- It was summer yesterday; now it's autumn.
Echoes of departure keep resounding in the air.

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