Flowers of Evil

[Samuel Fuller cameo in: Jean-Luc Godard, "Pierrot le fou" (1965)]

Destruction

The Demon is always moving about at my side;
He floats about me like an impalpable air;
I swallow him, I feel him burn my lungs
And fill them with an eternal, sinful desire.

Sometimes, knowing my deep love for Art, he assumes
The form of a most seductive woman,
And, with pretexts specious and hypocritical,
Accustoms my lips to infamous philtres.

He leads me thus, far from the sight of God,
Panting and broken with fatigue, into the midst
Of the plains of Ennui, endless and deserted,

And thrusts before my eyes full of bewilderment,
Dirty filthy garments and open, gaping wounds,
And all the bloody instruments of Destruction!

[William Aggeler (Charles Baudelaire), The Flowers of Evil
(Fresno, CA: Academy Library Guild, 1954)]