Poems and Baudelaire Flowers/The Spiritual Dawn

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Poems and Baudelaire Flowers
by Charles Baudelaire, translated by John Collings Squire
2672893Poems and Baudelaire FlowersJohn Collings SquireCharles Baudelaire

THE SPIRITUAL DAWN

When upon revellers the stained dawn breaks
The fierce ideal comes with it; at that hour,
Stirred by some terrible avenging power,
An angel in the sated brute awakes.

Above the stricken, suffering man there glow
Far azure plains of unimagined bliss
Which draw his dreaming spirit like the abyss.
O pure, beloved Goddess, even so

O’er the smoked wrecks of stupid scenes of shame
Brighter and rosier thy sweet memory
Hovers before my wide eyes hauntingly. . . .


The Sun has dimmed and charred the candles’ flame,
And thus, my glorious all-conquering one,
Thy shade is peer to the immortal Sun.