Maldoror and Poems Read online

  4

  It is midnight; there is no longer a single omnibus to be seen, from the Bastille to the Madelaine. I am wrong; here is one which has appeared suddenly, as if from under the earth. A few late passers-by are looking at it attentively; for it does not resemble any other. On the open top deck men are sitting, with fixed unmoving eyes like dead fish. They are hunched up tight beside one another and seem to be lifeless; apart from that, the number of passengers permitted by the regulations has not been exceeded. When the coachman whips his horses, you would think it was the whip moving his hand, not his hand moving the whip. Who can this group of strange dumb people be? Are they moon-dwellers? There are moments when one would be tempted to believe so; but they are more like corpses. The omnibus, anxious to arrive at the last stop, tears through space, making the roads rattle...It is disappearing!...But a shapeless form is madly pursuing it, in its wake, amid the dust. 'Stop, I beg you, stop...my legs are swollen from a day's walking...I have not eaten since yesterday...My parents have abandoned me...I do not know what to do now...I have made up my mind to go back home and I would be there soon if you would let me have a seat...I am only a little boy, eight years old, I trust in you...’ It is disappearing!...It is disappearing!...But a shapeless form is madly pursuing it, in its wake, amid the dust. One of the men, cold-eyed, nudges his neighbour and seems to be expressing his displeasure at these silvery moans which reach his ears. The other imperceptibly nods his head in agreement, only to plunge again into motionless self-absorption, like a tortoise into his shell. Everything in the expressions of the other travelers indicates that their feelings are the same as the first two. The cries can be heard for two or three minutes, becoming shriller every second. Along the boulevard one can see windows being opened and the frightened face of someone with a candle in his hand who, having looked out into the street, slams the shutters to again, and does not reappear...It is disappearing!...It is disappearing!...But a shapeless form pursues it madly, in its wake, amid the dust. Among all the stony faces, only a young man absorbed in reverie seems to feel any pity for the boy's misery. He does not dare to raise his voice on behalf of the child, who still thinks he can reach the omnibus with his aching little feet; for the other men are casting contemptuous, imperious looks at him and he knows he can do nothing against their will. Stunned, his head in his hands, his elbows resting on his knees, he wonders if this is an example of ‘human charity.’ Then he realizes that it is only an empty phrase which is no longer even to be found in the dictionary of poetry, and he freely admits his mistake. He says to himself: ‘In fact, why should I be interested in this small child? Let us leave him behind.’ Yet a hot tear rolls down the cheek of this adolescent who has just blasphemed. Uneasy, he passes his hand across his brow, as if to push away a cloud whose opacity darkens his intelligence. He is struggling in vain in the century into which he has been thrown; he feels that this is not where he belongs, and yet he cannot get out. Terrible prison! Dreadful fatality! Lombano, since that day I have been well pleased with you! I did not cease to observe you, while my face appeared to be as indifferent as that of the other travelers. With an impulse of indignation the adolescent gets up and wants to go away, so as not to participate, even unwillingly, in an evil action. I beckon him, and he comes to my side...It is disappearing!...It is disappearing!...But a shapeless form pursues it madly, in its wake, amid the dust. Suddenly, the cries cease; for the child has tripped over a stone protruding from the road’s surface, and he has injured his head in falling. The omnibus has disappeared over the horizon and all that can be seen now is the silent street... It is disappearing!...It is disappearing!...But a shapeless form no longer pursues it madly, in its wake, amid the dust. Behold a ragman passing, bending over the child with his dim lantern in his hand; he has more goodness of heart than all his fellows in the omnibus. He has just lifted up the child; you may be sure that he will heal him, that he will not abandon him as his parents did. It is disappearing!...It is disappearing!...But from where he is standing the ragman’s piercing look pursues it madly, in its wake, amid the dust. Stupid, idiotic race! You will regret having acted thus! It is I who tell you. You will regret it! My poetry will consist exclusively of attacks on man, that wild beast, and the Creator, who ought never to have bred such vermin. Volume after volume will accumulate, till the end of my life; yet this single idea only will be found, ever present in my mind!

  5

  On my daily walk I used to pass through a narrow street every day. Every day a slim ten-year-old girl would follow me along the street, keeping a respectful distance, looking at me with sympathetic, curious eyes. She was big for her age, and had a well-shaped body. Long, black hair, parted on her head, fell in separate tresses on to shoulders like marble. One day she was following me as usual; the sturdy arms of a woman of the people caught her by the hair, like a whirlwind catches a leaf, and slapped her twice, brutally, on her proud, silent face. Then she brought that straying consciousness back home. I tried in vain to appear unconcerned; she never failed to pursue me, though her presence had by now become irksome. When I took a different route, she would stop, struggling violently to control herself, at the end of the street, standing still as the statue of silence, and she would not cease looking before her until I was out of sight. One day this girl went on ahead of me in the street, and fell into step with me. If I walked faster to pass by her, she almost ran to keep the same distance between us. But if I slowed down so that there would be a large space between us, she slowed down too, and did so with all the grace of childhood. When we reached the end of the street, she slowly turned round barring my way. There was no time no for me to slip away; now I stood before her. Her eyes were swollen and red. It was easy to see that she wanted to speak to me, but did not know how to go about it. Her face suddenly turning pate as a corpse, she asked me: ‘Would you be so kind as to tell me what time it is?’ I told her I did not have a watch and walked rapidly away. And since that day, child of the troubled and precocious imagination, you have not seen in your narrow street the mysterious young man whose heavy sandals could be heard clattering along those winding roads. The appearance of this blazing comet will never be repeated; the mournful object of your fanatical curiosity will no longer flash on the facade of your disappointed observation. And you will often think, too often, perhaps always, of him who did not seem to be worried about the good and evil of this life, who went haphazardly away—with his face horribly dead, his hair standing on end, with a tottering gait, his arms swimming blindly in the ironic waters of ether, as if he were seeking there the bleeding prey of hope, continually buoyed up, through the immense regions of space, by the implacable snow-plough of fatality. You will see me no more, and I will no longer see you!...Who knows? Perhaps this young girl was not what she appeared to be. Perhaps boundless cunning, eighteen years’ experience and the charm of vice were hidden beneath her innocent appearance. Young sellers of love have been known to leave the British Isles gaily behind them and cross the channel. They spread their wings, whirling in golden swarms in the Parisian light; and whenever they were seen, people would say: ‘they are no more than ten or twelve years old’. But in reality they were twenty. Oh, if this supposition be true, cursed be the windings of that dark street! Horrible! horrible! the things that happen there. I think her mother struck her because she was not plying her trade skillfully enough. It is possible that she was only a child and, in that case, the mother is even more guilty. For my part, I refuse to believe this supposition, which is only a hypothesis and I prefer to see and to love, in this romantic character, a soul revealing itself too soon...Ah, young girl, I charge you not to reappear before me, if ever I return to that narrow street. It could cost you dear! No! No! I, generous enough to love my fellows! I have resolved against it since the day of my birth! They do not love me! Worlds will be destroyed, granite will glide like a cormorant on the surface of the waves before I touch the infamous hands of another human being. Back...back with that hand! Young girl, you are no
angel, you will become like other women after all. No, no, I implore you, do not reappear before my frowning squinting eyes. In a moment of distraction I might take your arms and wring them like linen which is squeezed after washing, or break them with a crack like two dry branches and then forcible make you eat them. Taking our head between my hands with a gentle, caressing air, I might dig my greedy fingers into the lobes of your innocent brain—to extract, with a smile on my lips, a substance which is good ointment to bathe my eyes, sore from the eternal insomnia of life. I might, by stitching you eyelids together, deprive you of the spectacle of the universe, and make it impossible for you to see your way; and then I should certainly not act as your guide. I might, raising your virgin body in my iron arms, seize you by the legs and swing you around me like a front, concentrating all my strength as I described the final circle, and hurling you against the wall. Each drop of your blood would spurt on to a human breast, to frighten men and to set before them an example of my wickedness. They will tear shreds and shreds of flesh from their bodies; but the drop of blood remains, ineffaceable, in the same place, and will shin like a diamond. Do not be alarmed. I will instruct half a dozen servants to keep the venerated remains of your body and to protect them from the ravenous hunger of the dogs. No doubt the body has remained stuck to the wall like a ripe pear and has not fallen to the earth; but a dog can jump extremely high, if one is not careful...

  6

  How delightful this child is, sitting on a bench in the Tuileries garden. His bold eyes dart looks at some invisible object, far off in the distance. He cannot be more than eight years old, yet he is not playing happily and in a manner which would befit one of his years. He should at least be laughing and walking with some friend, but to do so would not be in character.

  How delightful this child is, sitting on a bench in the Tuileries garden! A man, moved by a hidden design, comes and sits beside him on the bench. His manner is suspicious. Who is he? I need not tell you, for you will recognize him by his tortuous conversation. Let us listen to them, without disturbing them: ‘What were you thinking of, my child?’

  ‘I was thinking of heaven.’

  ‘You do not need to think about heaven. It is quite enough to think about this earth. Are you tired of life, you who have only just been born?’

  ‘No, but everyone prefers heaven to earth.’

  ‘Not I. For since heaven, like earth, has been made by God, you may be sure that there you will meet the same evils as down here. After your death you will not be rewarded according to you merits; for injustices are done you on this earth (and experience will later teach you that they are), there is no reason why, in the next life, they should not continue to be committed. The best thing you can do is not to think of God and to take the law into your own hands, since justice is denied you. If one of your companions offended you, would you not be glad to kill him?’

  ‘But it is forbidden.’

  ‘It is not as forbidden as you think. It is just a matter of not getting caught. The justice of laws is worthless; it is the jurisprudence of the offended party which counts. If you detested one of your companions, would you not be wretched at the thought of constantly having his image before your mind’s eye?’

  ‘That is true.’

  ‘Such a companion would make you wretched for the rest of your life; for, seeing that your hatred is only passive, he will continue to sneer at you and hurt you with impunity. So there is only one way of putting an end to the situation; that is to get rid of one’s enemy. This is the point I wanted to make, so that you would understand the basis on which our present society is founded. Each man, unless he is simply an imbecile, must take the law into his own hands. He who gains victory over his fellow-men is the cleverest and the strongest. Would you not like to dominate your fellow-men?’

  ‘Yes, yes.’

  ‘Then be the strongest and the cleverest. You are too young yet to be the strongest; but from today you can use guile, the finest instrument of men of genius. When the shepherd-boy David struck the giant Goliath’s forehead with a stone from a sling, is it not wonderful to note that it was only cunning which enabled David to conquer his adversary and that if on the other hand it had come to a hand-to-hand fight, the giant would have crushed him like a fly? In open war you will never be able to conquer men, on whom you wish to impose your will; but with cunning you can fight alone against them all. You desire riches, palaces, fame? Or were you deceiving me when you declared these noble aspirations?’

  ‘No, no, I was not deceiving you. But I would like to attain what I want by other means.’

  ‘Then you will achieve nothing. Virtuous and well-meaning methods lead nowhere. You must bring into play more powerful levers, more cunningly contrived traps. Before your virtue has brought you fame, before you have achieved your goal, a hundred others will have time to leap-frog over your back and arrive at the winning-post ahead of you, so that there will be no more room left for your narrow ideas. One must be able to embrace more amply the horizon of the present time. Have you not heard for example of the immense glory victories bring? And yet victories do not simply happen. Blood must be shed, a lot of blood, to achieve them and to lay them at the feet of conquerors. Without the corpses and the scattered limbs you see on the plain where carnage is wisely practised, there would be no war and, without war, there would be no victory. You see that, when one wants to be famous, one has to dive gracefully into rivers of the blood of cannon-blasted bodies. The end excuses the means. The first thing you need to be famous is to have money. Now, as you have none, you will have to murder to acquire it; but as you are not strong enough to handle a dagger, become a thief until your limbs are big enough. That they may grow more quickly, I advise you to do gymnastics twice a day, one hour in the morning, one at night. In this way, you will be able to start your career of crime at fifteen, instead of waiting till you are twenty. Love of glory excuses everything and perhaps later when you are the master of your fellow-men you will do them almost as much good as you did them harm in the beginning!...’

  Maldoror notices that the blood is boiling in his young interlocutor’s head; his nostrils are swollen; his lips are flecked with a light white foam. He feels his pulse; it is beating very fast. Fever has taken hold of this delicate body. He fears the consequences his words will have; the wretch sneaks away, frustrated at not having been able to converse longer with the child. When even in mature years it is so difficult to master our passions, poised between good and evil, how hard it must be for so inexperienced a mind? How much more relative energy is required! The child will escape at the price of three days in bed. May it please heaven that his mother’s presence should restore peace to this sensitive flower, the frail exterior of a fine soul!

  7

  In a flowery grove the hermaphrodite sleeps a deep, heavy sleep, drenched in his tears. The moon’s disc has come clear of the mass of clouds, and with its pale beams caresses his gentle adolescent face. His features express the most virile energy as well as the grace of a celestial virgin. Nothing about him seems natural, not even the muscles of his body, which clear their way across the harmonious contours of a feminine form. He has one arm around his head and another around his breast, as if to restrain the beating of a heart which can make no confidences, laden with the heavy burden of an eternal secret. Tired of life and ashamed of walking among beings who are not like him, he has given his soul up to despair and wanders alone, like the beggar of the valley. By what means does he live? Though he does not realize it, compassionate souls are watching over him near at hand, and they will not abandon him: he is so good! he is so resigned! Sometimes, he willingly talks with sensitive people, without touching their hands, keeping at a safe distance for fear of an imaginary danger. If he is asked why he has chosen solitude as his companion, he raises his eyes towards the sky, scarcely restraining tears of reproach against Providence; but he does not reply to this tactless question, which fills his eyes, otherwise white as snow, with the redness of the morn
ing rose. If the conversation goes on, he becomes anxious, looks around him in all directions as if he is trying to flee from an approaching enemy, quickly waves good-bye and moves off on the wings of his reawakened sense of shame to disappear into the forest. he is generally taken for a madman. One day four masked men, acting on orders, fell upon him and bound him tightly, so that he could only move his legs. The rough thongs of the whip crashed down on his back as they told him to make his way without delay to the Bicetre road. He started to smile as the blows rained down on him and spoke to them with such feeling and intelligence of the many human sciences he had studied which indicated great erudition in one who had not yet crossed the threshold of youth, and of the destiny of mankind fully revealing the poetic nobility of his soul, that his attackers, chilled to the blood with fear at the act which they had committed, untied his broken limbs, and falling at his knees, begged forgiveness, which was granted, and went away, showing signs of a veneration which is not ordinarily accorded to men. Since this event, which was much spoken of, everyone has guessed his secret; but they pretend not to know it so as not to increase his suffering; and the government has granted him an honorary pension, to make him forget that there was a moment when, without preliminary investigation, they had wanted to put him by force into a lunatic asylum. He keeps half of the money for his own use; the rest he gives to the poor. When he sees a man and a woman walking along a path shaded by plane-trees, he feels his body splitting from top to bottom into two parts, and each new part going to embrace one of the walkers; but it is only a hallucination, and reason soon takes over again. That is why he mixes neither with men nor with women; for his excessively strong sense of shame, which arose with the idea that he was only a monster, prevents him from giving his burning love to anyone. He would consider it self-profanation, and profanation of others. His pride repeats this axiom to him: ‘Let each remain among his own kind.’ His pride, I say, because he fears that by sharing his life with a man or a woman, he will sooner or later be reproached, as if it were a dreadful crime, for the conformation of his body. So he shelters behind his self-esteem, offended by this impious supposition, which comes from him alone, and he persists in remaining alone and without consolation amidst his torments. There in a flowery grove the hermaphrodite sleeps a deep heavy sleep, drenched in his tears. The birds, waking, contemplate, enraptured, this melancholy figure, through the branches of the trees, and the nightingale will not sing its crystal-toned cavatinas. The presence of the unhappy hermaphrodite has made the wood as august as a tomb. Oh wanderer mislead by your spirit of adventure to leave your father and mother from the earliest age; by the sufferings you have undergone from thirst, in the desert; by the homeland you are perhaps seeking, after long wanderings as an outlaw in strange lands; by your steed, your faithful friend, who with you has borne exile and the inclemency of the climes which your roaming disposition has brought you through; by the dignity which is given man by journeys through distant lands and unexplored seas, amid the polar ice-floes, or under the torrid desert sun, do not touch with your hand, like a tremor of the breeze, these ringlets of hair on the ground among the grass. Stand back several steps, and you will be acting more wisely. This hair is sacred; it is the wish of the hermaphrodite himself; he does not wish this hair, perfumed by the mountain breeze, to be kissed religiously by human lips, nor his brow, which shines at this moment like the stars which has fallen from its orbit, passing through space and on to this majestic brow, which it surrounds with its diamantine brightness, like a halo. Night, casting off sadness, puts on all its charms to fete the sleep of this incarnation of modesty, this perfect image of angelic innocence: the gentle humming of insects is less audible. The branches of trees bend their bushy heights over him to protect him from the dew, and the breeze, plucking the strings of its melodious harp, sends it joyous harmonies through the universal silence towards those closed eyelids which are dreaming that they are present at the cadenced concert of the spheres. He dreams that he is happy, that his bodily nature has changed; or that at least he has flown off on a dark-red cloud towards another sphere inhabited by beings whose nature is the same as his! He dreams that flowers are dancing around him like huge mad garlands, imbuing him with their suave perfumes, while he sings a hymn of love in the arms of a human being of magical beauty. But what his arms are clasping is only twilight mist; and when he awakes, his arms will clasp it no longer. Do not awaken, hermaphrodite; do not awaken yet, I implore you. Why will you not believe me? Sleep...sleep on for ever. May your breast rise as you pursue the chimerical hope of happiness. I grant you that; but do not open your eyes. Ah! do not open your eyes! I want to leave you thus, so that I do not have to witness your awakening. Perhaps, one day, with the help of a voluminous book, I will tell your story in moving words, appalled by all that it contains and by the moving lessons to be drawn from it. Till now, I have not been able to; for every time that I wanted to, copious tears would fall on to the paper, and my fingers would tremble, but not from old age. But now I want to have the courage at last. I am shocked that my nerves are no stronger than a woman’s and that I faint like a girl every time I reflect on your great misery. Sleep...sleep on; but do not open your eyes. Ah! do not open your eyes! Adieu, hermaphrodite: I will not fail to pray every day for you (if it were for myself, I should not pray). May peace be with you!