Antiquitopia

So last year to wish all a happy All Hallow's Eve, I posted the earliest reference to a zombie in the world .  So this year I thought I would post on a rather recent poem on my favorite undead creature, the vampire: The Vampire Sudden as a knife you thrust into my sorry heart and strong as a host of demons come, gaudy and libertine, to make in my corrupted mind your bed and bedlam there; --Beast, who bind me to you close as convict to his chains, as gambler to his winning streak, as drunkard to his wine, close as the carrion to its worms-- I curse you!  Be accursed! I begged the sword by one swift stroke to grant me liberty; nor did my cowardice disdain less clear-cut remedies. Poison and steel, as with one voice, contemptuously refused; "You are not worthy to be free of your enslavement, fool! Suppose we saved you, even now, from her supremacy-- your kisses would resuscitate your vampire's waiting corpse!" (Baudelaire, "The Vam...

Correspondences La Nature est un temple où de vivant piliers Laissent parfois sortir de confuses paroles; L'homme y passe à travers des forêts de symboles Qui l'observent avec des regards familiers. Comme de longs échos qui de loin se confondent Dans une ténébreuse et profonde unité, Vaste comme la nuit et comme la clarté, Les parfums, les couleurs et les sons se répondent. Il 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," Les Fleurs du Mal ) This fantastic poem incites all of the senses, but perhaps mostly the most potent, memorable, and evanescent one of all: smell. It ranges from such sensuous activation to the rapture of the soul (les transports de l'esprit ...