"correspondences"sharl Bodler

Correspondances La Nature est un temple où de vivants piliersLaissent parfois sortir de confuses paroles;L'homme y passe à travers des forêts de symbolesQui l'observent avec des regards familiers. Comme de longs échos qui de loin se confondentDans une ténébreuse et profonde unité,Vaste comme la nuit et comme la clarté,Les parfums, les couleurs et les sons se répondent. II est des parfums frais comme des chairs d'enfants,Doux comme les hautbois, verts comme les prairies,— Et d'autres, corrompus, riches et triomphants, Ayant l'expansion des choses infinies,Comme l'ambre, le musc, le benjoin et l'encens,Qui chantent les transports de l'esprit et des sens. — Charles Baudelaire Correspondences Nature is a temple in which living pillars Sometimes give voice to confused words; Man passes there through forests of symbols Which look at him with understanding eyes. Like prolonged echoes mingling in the distance In a deep and tenebrous unity, Vast as the dark of night and as the light of day, Perfumes, sounds, and colors correspond. There are perfumes as cool as the flesh of children,Sweet as oboes, green as meadows— And others are corrupt, and rich, triumphant, With power to expand into infinity,Like amber and incense, musk, benzoin, That sing the ecstasy of the soul and senses. — William Aggeler, The Flowers of Evil (Fresno, CA: Academy Library Guild, 1954) Correspondences Nature's a temple where each living column, At times, gives forth vague words. There Man advances Through forest-groves of symbols, strange and solemn, Who follow him with their familiar glances. As long-drawn echoes mingle and transfuse Till in a deep, dark unison they swoon, Vast as the night or as the vault of noon — So are commingled perfumes, sounds, and hues. There can be perfumes cool as children's flesh,Like fiddIes, sweet, like meadows greenly fresh.Rich, complex, and triumphant, others roll With the vast range of all non-finite things — Amber, musk, incense, benjamin, each sings The transports of the senses and the soul. — Roy Campbell, Poems of Baudelaire (New York: Pantheon Books, 1952) Correspondences All nature is one temple, the living aisles whereof Murmur in a soft language, half strange, half understood; Man wanders there as through a cabalistic wood, Aware of eyes that watch him in the leaves above. Like voices echoing in his senses from beyondLife's watery source, and

which into one voice unite, Vast as the turning planet clothed in darkness and light, So do all sounds and hues and fragrances correspond. Perfumes there are as sweet as the music of pipes and strings,As pure as the naked flesh of children, as full of peaceAs wide green prairies — and there are others, having the whole Corrupt proud all-pervasiveness of infinite things, Like frankincense, and musk, and myrrh, and ambergris, That cry of the ecstasy of the body and of the soul. — George Dillon, Flowers of Evil (NY: Harper and Brothers, 1936) Correspondences In Nature's temple, living pillars rise, Speaking sometimes in words of abstruse sense; Man walks through woods of symbols, dark and dense, Which gaze at him with fond familiar eyes. Like distant echoes blent in the beyond In unity, in a deep darksome way, Vast as black night and vast as splendent day, Perfumes and sounds and colors correspond. Some scents are cool as children's flesh is cool, Sweet as are oboes, green as meadowlands, And others rich, corrupt, triumphant, full, Expanding as infinity expands: Benzoin or musk or amber that incenses, Hymning the ecstasy of soul and senses. — Jacques LeClercq, Flowers of Evil (Mt Vernon, NY: Peter Pauper Press, 1958) Correspondances Nature's a fane where down each corridorof living pillars, darkling whispers roll,— a symbol-forest every pilgrim soulmust pierce, 'neath gazing eyes it knew before. like echoes long that from afar rebound,merged till one deep low shadowy note is born,vast as the night or as the fires of morn,sound calls to fragrance, colour calls to sound. cool as an infant's brow some perfumes are,softer than oboes, green as rainy leas;others, corrupt, exultant, rich, unbar wide infinities wherein we move at ease:— musk, ambergris, frankincense, benjaminchant all our soul or sense can revel in. — Lewis Piaget Shanks, Flowers of Evil (New York: Ives Washburn, 1931) Correspondences Nature is a temple where living pillars Let sometimes emerge confused words; Man crosses it through forests of symbols Which watch him with intimate eyes. Like those deep echoes that meet from afar In a dark and profound harmony, As vast as night and clarity, So perfumes, colors, tones answer each other. There are perfumes fresh as children's flesh,Soft as oboes, green as meadows,And others, corrupted, rich, triumphant, Possessing the diffusion of infinite things, Like amber, musk, incense and

aromatic resin, Chanting the ecstasies of spirit and senses. — Geoffrey Wagner, Selected Poems of Charles Baudelaire