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“ ”THE OWLS
by: Charles Baudelaire
UNDER the overhanging yews,
The dark owls sit in solemn state,
Like stranger gods; by twos and twos
Their red eyes gleam. They meditate.
Motionless thus they sit and dream
Until that melancholy hour
When, with the sun's last fading gleam,
The nightly shades assume their power.
From their still attitude the wise
Will learn with terror to despise
All tumult, movement, and unrest;
For he who follows every shade,
Carries the memory in his breast,
Of each unhappy journey made.
'The Owls' is reprinted from The Poems and Prose Poems of Charles Baudelaire. Ed. James Huneker. New York: Brentano's, 1919.
About Charles Baudelaire
Charles Baudelaire (9 April 1821 – 31 August 1867) was a French poet, critic and translator.
Biography information from Wikiquote
Additional quotes by Charles Baudelaire
I worship you like night's pavilion,
O vase of sadness, o great silent one,
And love you more since you escape from me,
And since you seem, my night's sublimity,
To mock me and increase the leagues that lie
Between my arms and blue immensity.
I move to the attack, besiege, assail,
Like eager worms after a funeral.
I even love, o beast implacable,
The coldness which makes you more beautiful.
There are women who inspire you with the desire to conquer them and to take your pleasure of them; but this one fills you only with the desire to die slowly beneath her gaze.
The devil's finest trick is to persuade you that he does not exist.