The Balcony
Oh, Mother of Memories! Mistress of Mistresses!Oh, thou all my pleasures, oh, thou all my prayers!Can'st thou remember those luscious caresses,The charm of the hearth and the sweet evening airs?Oh, Mother, of Memories, Mistress of Mistresses!
Those evenings illumed by the glow of the coal,And those roseate nights with their vaporous wings,How calm was thy breast and how good was thy soul,'Twas then we uttered imperishable things,Those evenings illumed by the glow of the coal.
How lovely the suns on those hot, autumn nights!How vast were the heavens! and the heart how hale!As I leaned towards you--oh, my Queen of Delights,The scent of thy blood I seemed to inhale.How lovely the sun on those hot, autumn nights!
The shadows of night-time grew dense like a pall,And deep through the darkness thine eyes I divined,And I drank of thy breath--oh sweetness, oh gall,And thy feet in my brotherly hands reclined,The shadows of Night-time grew dense like a pall.
I know how to call forth those moments so dear,And to live my Past--laid on thy knees--once more,For where should I seek for thy beauties but hereIn thy langorous heart and thy body so pure?I know how to call forth those moments so dear.
Those perfumes, those infinite kisses and sighs,Are they born in some gulf to our plummets denied?Like rejuvenate suns that mount up to the skies,That first have been cleansed in the depths of the tide;Oh, perfumes! oh, infinite kisses and sighs!
Words in this poem
- luscious a.
- Sweet; delicious; very grateful to the taste; toothsome; excessively sweet or rich. [Prob. for lustious, fr. lusty, or perh. a corruption of luxurious. Cf. Lush, Lusty.]
- roseate a.
- Full of roses; rosy; as, roseate bowers. [Cf. L. roseus, rosatus, prepared from roses. See Roseal, Rose.]
- drank n.
- Wild oats, or darnel grass. See Drake a plant. [Cf. 3d Drake.]
- reclined a.
- Falling or turned downward; reclinate.
- rejuvenate v. t.
- To render young again. [Pref. re- re- + L. juventis young, youthful.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Balcony is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Flowers of Evil, Project Gutenberg ebook #36098; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Charles Baudelaire, The Balcony, in The Flowers of Evil (1909), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #36098, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/baudelaire-flowers-of-evil/the-balcony.html, id L25411.
Form and metre
The Balcony is 30 lines in 6 stanzas of 5 lines each. The rhyme scheme is ABABA, complete in 4 of its 6 stanzas. The metre is anapaestic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 83%).
See other poems in anapaestic tetrameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 AB-BA mistressesA · prayersB · caresses · airsB · mistressesA
- 2 ABABA coalA · wingsB · soulA · thingsB · coalA
- 3 ABABA nightsA · haleB · delightsA · inhaleB · nightsA
- 4 ABABA pallA · divinedB · gallA · reclinedB · pallA
- 5 A-A-A dearA · more · hereA · pure · dearA
- 6 ABABA sighsA · deniedB · skiesA · tideB · sighsA
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against anapaestic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Oh, Mother of Memories! Mistress of Mistresses! | 12 | ·/˘·/˘/˘·/˘˘ |
| Oh, thou all my pleasures, oh, thou all my prayers! | 11 | ····/˘····· |
| Can'st thou remember those luscious caresses, | 11 | ··˘/˘·/˘˘/˘ |
| The charm of the hearth and the sweet evening airs? | 11 | ········/˘· |
| Oh, Mother, of Memories, Mistress of Mistresses! | 12 | ·/˘·/˘/˘·/˘˘ |
| Those evenings illumed by the glow of the coal, | 11 | ·/˘········ |
| And those roseate nights with their vaporous wings, | 11 | ··/˘···/˘˘· |
| How calm was thy breast and how good was thy soul, | 11 | ··········· |
| 'Twas then we uttered imperishable things, | 11 | ···/˘˘/˘˘˘· |
| Those evenings illumed by the glow of the coal. | 11 | ·/˘········ |
| How lovely the suns on those hot, autumn nights! | 11 | ·/˘·····/˘· |
| How vast were the heavens! and the heart how hale! | 11 | ····/˘····· |
| As I leaned towards you--oh, my Queen of Delights, | 11 | ·········˘/ |
| The scent of thy blood I seemed to inhale. | 11 | ·······˘·˘/ |
| How lovely the sun on those hot, autumn nights! | 11 | ·/˘·····/˘· |
| The shadows of night-time grew dense like a pall, | 11 | ·/········· |
| And deep through the darkness thine eyes I divined, | 11 | ····/˘···˘/ |
| And I drank of thy breath--oh sweetness, oh gall, | 11 | ·······/˘·· |
| And thy feet in my brotherly hands reclined, | 11 | ·····/˘˘·˘/ |
| The shadows of Night-time grew dense like a pall. | 11 | ·/········· |
| I know how to call forth those moments so dear, | 11 | ·······/˘·· |
| And to live my Past--laid on thy knees--once more, | 11 | ··········· |
| For where should I seek for thy beauties but here | 11 | ·······/˘·· |
| In thy langorous heart and thy body so pure? | 12 | ········/˘·· |
| I know how to call forth those moments so dear. | 11 | ·······/˘·· |
| Those perfumes, those infinite kisses and sighs, | 11 | ·˘/·/˘˘/˘·· |
| Are they born in some gulf to our plummets denied? | 12 | ·······//˘˘/ |
| Like rejuvenate suns that mount up to the skies, | 12 | ·˘/˘········ |
| That first have been cleansed in the depths of the tide; | 11 | ··········· |
| Oh, perfumes! oh, infinite kisses and sighs! | 11 | ·˘/·/˘˘/˘·· |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.