roaches rooming in the other. Yet in
his heart already yellowing like teeth,
he dreamt of shining at the court. We wait
(in Romance it means
hope)
but underneath
the coming (never here) of desolate
and flaming death is the sad going (never gone)
of every second since the flood at Ur.
I pull the shade. Sun. Suddenly the damp
Midwest is Babylon. I'm on the floor
of the Creation, under a clay lamp,
a child, captive to hope, scheming at dawn.
CHARLES BAUDELAIRE
The Blind People
What is the difference between the unlimited
blackness they walk in this ridiculous
fashion through, and the eternal silence?
The sounds of the city, with
all
its laughter and music,
are a denial I walk through with my stupid
questions when I look at them. What are they
looking up at the sky for, with such blind
scrutinizing? Just think about them. How foolish,
and terrible, they look; weird; sleepwalkers;
puppets on a string, the divine light gone
forever from their eyes. They keep on staring
up at the sky; you never see them bow
their dreaming heads in noble meditation
over the pavements of the raucous city.
Translated from the French
by
David Ferry
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