Charles Baudelaire

Sepulcher

If on a dismal, sultry night Some good Christian, through charity, Will bury your vaunted body Behind the ruins of a building At the hour when the chaste stars Close their eyes, heavy with sleep, The spider will make his webs there, And the viper his progeny; You will hear all year long Above your damned head The mournful cries of wolves And of the half-starved witches, The frolics of lustful old men And the plots of vicious robbers. Translated by - William Aggeler The Burial of an Accursed Poet If haply one dark, dreary night Some charitable soul appear And 'neath old rubble stow from sight The body that you held so dear - What time the chaste stars veil their eyes, Drowsy and fain for slumber, there Spiders shall weave their traceries. Vipers their spotted young shall bear. Above your doomed head you will hear Each night throughout the heavy year The lean wolves' melancholy cries, Famished hags' bowlings for a crust, Lewd pastimes of old men who lust, And scoundrels' dark conspiracies. Translated by - Jack Collings Squire Sepulchre If on a dark and leaden night Some Christian soul, through charity, Bury your body, once so bright, By some ruined tenement's debris, At the dim hour when starlight ebbs And the stars doze against the dawn, There shall the spider weave his webs And there the viper breed his spawn. There ceaselessly throughout the year Over your damned head you shall hear Dour wails of wolves and crazy rhymes Of starveling witches and grim snorts Of greybeard lechers at their sports And evil robbers hatching crimes. Translated by - Jacques LeClercq The Burial of an Accursed Poet If on a night obscure and deep, Some decent Christian, out of ruth, Buries behind some garbage-heap The vaunted body of your youth: There, when the chaster stars have set And the moon her hammock slung Will the spider weave his net And the adder batch her young. Your curse'd head beneath the ground Will hear, through all the seasons then, The dismal cries of wolves resound, Old half-starved witches raising spooks, The antics of obscene old men, And black conspiracies of crooks. Translated by - Roy Campbell

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