The Grave Of Charles Baudelaire Poem by John Lars Zwerenz

THE GRAVE OF CHARLES BAUDELAIRE

Snug within your rainy cave,
There are stanzas which rise
From the grass of your grave.
Beneath the languid moon you hypnotize
The rare passersby
Who lay their fresh bouquets
Over six feet of earth,
Over the wooden casket in which you lie.
The lawn plays above you in the sunlight's summer rays.
And when no one is near your mouth gives birth
To a new protest, in spoken verse to the starry sky.
And when the stars are eclipsed by the darkness of the clouds,
You ascend from your crypt, strolling amid the burial shrouds,
Among the tombstones devoid of light,
Alive once more in this world you thought to be banal.
And you recite as a specter in the cryptic night,
Below the mysterious, haunting trees
Les Fleurs du mal
In the ghostly breeze.

John Lars Zwerenz