Duellum
By Charles Baudelaire
Two warriors have grappled, and their arms
Have flecked the air with blood and flashing steel.
These frolics, this mad clanking, these alarms
Proceed from childish love's frantic appeal.
The swords are broken! like our youthful life
My dear! But tooth and nail, avid and sharp,
Soon fill the place of rapier and knife.
0 bitter heat of love, o cankered hearts!
In a ravine haunted by catlike forms
These two have tumbled, struggling to the end;
Shreds of their skin will bloom on arid thorns.
This pit is Hell, its denizens our friends!
Amazon, let us roll there guiltlessly
In spiteful fervour, for eternity!