Leaves

A translation of Baudelaire’s “Correspondances”

Nature is a trick whose trees
Are at the root of our conspiracies:
Trompe l’oeil tints and pseudonyms
With last year’s fashions on their limbs:

Soft as night and dark as rhyme:
Ancient snapshots stained by time,
Now-imaginary places
And half-life atomic traces

Of Dior, innocent as skin,
Or Chanel, original as sin,
Light as destiny on their faces,
History spread out into spaces,

Passing woodland scents
Carving spirit into sense.

August 18th, 2022, Rosebud
September 28th, 2022, Rosebud