Les Chats/Les Hiboux

I wonder if my lack of posting comes about directly as a result of my lack of drama. The ennui has mostly faded and I don't know if that is because I went an entire week without reading Les Fleurs du Mal or if it is because the person I question always says what he means and likes hanging out with me and doesn't give me bullshit and vagueness like the others did. In return, I don't have to give him bullshit or vagueness either. It's nice for a change. Really is. The world is not so melodramatic and no matter how full of rage I am over little X-factors, somehow they don't matter that much anymore.

Two animal poems. The second one reminded me a bit of my sister, for no reason other than the fact that she has been collecting owl things for about ten years now.

The Cats
The fervent lovers and the austere scholars
Love equally, in their mature season,
The cats strong and sweet, pride of the house,
Who like them are sensitive to cold and like them sedentary.

Friends of knowledge and of passion
Explore the silence and the horror of the darkness;
Erebus would have taken them for his gloomy steeds,
If they were able to give their pride into servitude.

In dreaming they take noble airs
Of great sphinxes stretched out in the depths of solitude,
Who seem to sleep in an endless dream;

Their fertile loins are full of magic sparks,
And fragments of gold, like fine sand,
Vaguely stud their mystical eyes.

Les Chats
Les amoureux fervents et les savants austères
Aiment également, dans leur mûre saison,
Les chats puissants et doux, orgueil de la maison,
Qui comme eux sont frileux et comme eux sédentaires.

Amis de la science et de la volupté
Ils cherchent le silence et l'horreur des ténèbres;
L'Erèbe les eût pris pour ses coursiers funèbres,
S'ils pouvaient au servage incliner leur fierté.

Ils prennent en songeant les nobles attitudes
Des grands sphinx allongés au fond des solitudes,
Qui semblent s'endormir dans un rêve sans fin;

Leurs reins féconds sont pleins d'étincelles magiques,
Et des parcelles d'or, ainsi qu'un sable fin,
Etoilent vaguement leurs prunelles mystiques.


The Owls
Under the yews which shelter them
The owls have arranged themselves
As foreign gods
Shooting their red eyes. They meditate.

Without moving they abide
Until the melancholy hour
Where, heaving back the slanting sun,
The darkness will establish itself.

Their attitude instructs the wise
That in this world one must fear
Uproar and movement;

Man drunk on a passing shadow
Forever carries the punishment
Of having wished to change his place.

Les Hiboux
Sous les ifs noirs qui les abritent
Les hiboux se tiennent rangés
Ainsi que des dieux étrangers
Dardant leur oeil rouge. Ils méditent.

Sans remuer ils se tiendront
Jusqu'à l'heure mélancolique
Où, poussant le soleil oblique,
Les ténèbres s'établiront.

Leur attitude au sage enseigne
Qu'il faut en ce monde qu'il craigne
Le tumulte et le mouvement;

L'homme ivre d'une ombre qui passe
Porte toujours le châtiment
D'avoir voulu changer de place.