SPLEEN

by: Charles Baudelaire

'M like some king in whose corrupted veins

Flows agèd blood; who rules a land of rains;

Who, young in years, is old in all distress;

Who flees good counsel to find weariness

Among his dogs and playthings, who is stirred

Neither by hunting-hound nor hunting-bird;

Whose weary face emotion moves no more

E'en when his people die before his door.

His favourite Jester's most fantastic wile

Upon that sick, cruel face can raise no smile;

The courtly dames, to whom all kings are good,

Can lighten this young skeleton's dull mood

No more with shameless toilets. In his gloom

Even his lilied bed becomes a tomb.

The sage who takes his gold essays in vain

To purge away the old corrupted strain,

His baths of blood, that in the days of old

The Romans used when their hot blood grew cold,

Will never warm this dead man's bloodless pains,

For green Lethean water fills his veins.

• Charles Baudelaire: Bibliography - A selected bibliography of the works of Charles Baudelaire available in English; includes a list of critical resources.
• Purchase books by Charles Baudelaire