The Perfume, Poem by Charles Baudelaire

Poem by Charles Baudelaire Collection The Flowers of EvilThemes MiscellaneousPeriod 19th century

Reader, have you ever breathed in
With rapture and slow relish
That grain of incense filling a church,
Or the aged musk of a sachet?

Profound, magic charm, whose spell makes us drunk
With the restored past in the present!
So the lover on a beloved body
Plucks from memory the exquisite flower.

From her heavy, springing hair,
Living sachet, censer of the alcove,
A scent rose, wild and feral,

And from her garments, muslin or velvet,
All steeped in her pure youth,
There escaped a perfume of fur.

Charles Baudelaire

Translation generated by Poésies 123 with assistance from the deepseek-chat artificial-intelligence model.

Text published on Poésies 123: https://www.poesies123.com/en/poem-the-perfume-charles-baudelaire/