A Fantastical Engraving

Charles Baudelaire 1821 (Paris) – 1867 (Paris)



This freakish ghost has nothing else to wear
But some cheap crown he picked up at a fair
Grotesquely perched atop his bony corpse.
Without a whip or spur he drives his horse
Ghostly as he, hack of apocalypse
To pant and drool like someone in a fit.
This duo makes its charge through endless space,
Trampling the infinite with reckless pace.
The horseman waves a blazing sword around
The nameless crowds he's trampled to the ground,
And like a prince inspecting his domain
He travels to a graveyard's empty plain
Where lie, with pallid sunshine overhead,
From old and modem times, the storied dead.
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Submitted on August 03, 2020

Modified on April 14, 2023

32 sec read
24

Quick analysis:

Scheme AABCDEFFGGHHII
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 584
Words 105
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 14

Charles Baudelaire

Charles Pierre Baudelaire was a French poet who also produced notable work as an essayist, art critic, and pioneering translator of Edgar Allan Poe. more…

All Charles Baudelaire poems | Charles Baudelaire Books

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