The Double Chamber Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCDEFGHIJKFLHMIGGGG NOP| A chamber that is like a reverie a chamber truly spiritual where the stagnant atmosphere is lightly touched with rose and blue | A |
| There the soul bathes itself in indolence made odorous with regret and desire There is some sense of the twilight of things tinged with blue and rose a dream of delight during an eclipse The shape of the furniture is elongated low languishing one would think it endowed with the somnambulistic vitality of plants and minerals | B |
| The tapestries speak an inarticulate language like the flowers the skies the dropping suns | C |
| There are no artistic abominations upon the walls | D |
| Compared with the pure dream with an impression unanalysed definite art positive art is a blasphemy | E |
| Here all has the sufficing lucidity and the delicious obscurity of music | F |
| An infinitesimal odour of the most exquisite choice mingled with a floating humidity swims in this atmosphere where the drowsing spirit is lulled by the sensations one feels in a hothouse | G |
| The abundant muslin flows before the windows and the couch and spreads out in snowy cascades Upon the couch lies the Idol ruler of my dreams But why is she here who has brought her what magical power has installed her upon this throne of delight and reverie What matter she is there and I recognise her | H |
| These indeed are the eyes whose flame pierces the twilight the subtle and terrible mirrors that I recognise by their horrifying malice They attract they dominate they devour the sight of whomsoever is imprudent enough to look at them I have often studied them these Black Stars that compel curiosity and admiration | I |
| To what benevolent demon then do I owe being thus surrounded with mystery with silence with peace and sweet odours O beatitude the thing we name life even in its most fortunate amplitude has nothing in common with this supreme life with which I am now acquainted which I taste minute by minute second by second | J |
| Not so Minutes are no more seconds are no more Time has vanished and Eternity reigns an Eternity of delight | K |
| A heavy and terrible knocking reverberates upon the door and as in a hellish dream it seems to me as though I had received a blow from a mattock | F |
| Then a Spectre enters it is an usher who comes to torture me in the name of the Law an infamous concubine who comes to cry misery and to add the trivialities of her life to the sorrow of mine or it may be the errand boy of an editor who comes to implore the remainder of a manuscript | L |
| The chamber of paradise the Idol the ruler of dreams the Sylphide as the great Rene said all this magic has vanished at the brutal knocking of the Spectre | H |
| Horror I remember I remember Yes this kennel this habitation of eternal weariness is indeed my own Here is my senseless furniture dusty and tattered the dirty fireplace without a name or an ember the sad windows where the raindrops have traced runnels in the dust the manuscripts erased or unfinished the almanac with the sinister days marked off with a pencil | M |
| And this perfume of another world whereof I intoxicated myself with a so perfected sensitiveness alas its place is taken by an odour of stale tobacco smoke mingled with I know not what nauseating mustiness Now one breathes here the rankness of desolation | I |
| In this narrow world narrow and yet full of disgust a single familiar object smiles at me the phial of laudanum old and terrible love like all loves alas fruitful in caresses and treacheries | G |
| Yes Time has reappeared Time reigns a monarch now and with the hideous Ancient has returned all his demoniacal following of Memories Regrets | G |
| Tremors Fears Dolours Nightmares and twittering nerves | G |
| I assure you that the seconds are strongly and solemnly accentuated now and each as it drips from the pendulum says | G |
| I am Life intolerable implacable Life | N |
| There is not a second in mortal life whose mission it is to bear good news the good news that brings the inexplicable tear to the eye | O |
| Yes Time reigns Time has regained his brutal mastery And he goads me as though I were a steer swith his double goad Woa thou fool Sweat then thou slave Live on thou damned | P |
Charles Baudelaire
(2)
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