Poems of Paul Verlaine

Your soul is as a moonlit landscape fair, Peopled with maskers delicate and dim, That play on lutes and dance and have an air Of being sad in their fantastic trim. The while they celebrate in minor strain Triumphant love, effective enterprise, They have an air of knowing all is vain,— And through the quiet moonlight their songs rise, The melancholy moonlight, sweet and lone, That makes to dream the birds upon the tree, And in their polished basins of white stone The fountains tall to sob with ecstasy.
The abbé rambles. — You, marquis, Have put your wig on all awry. — This wine of Cyprus kindles me Less, my Camargo, than your eye! My passion — Do, mi, sol, la, si. — Abbé, your villany lies bare. — Mesdames, I climb up yonder tree And fetch a star down, I declare. Let each kiss his own lady, then The others. — Would that I were, too, A lap-dog! — Softly, gentlemen! — Do, mi. — The moon! — Hey, how d'ye do?
Powdered and rouged as in the sheepcotes' day, Fragile 'mid her enormous ribbon bows, Along the shaded alley, where green grows The moss on the old seats, she wends her way With mincing graces and affected airs, Such as more oft a petted parrot wears. Her long gown with the train is blue; the fan She spreads between her jewelled fingers slim Is merry with a love-scene, of so dim Suggestion, her eyes smile the while they scan. Blonde; dainty nose; plump, cherry lips, divine With pride unconscious.—Subtler, certainly, Than is the mouche there set to underline The rather foolish brightness of the eye.
The milky sky, the hazy, slender trees, Seem smiling on the light costumes we wear,— Our gauzy floating veils that have an air Of wings, our satins fluttering in the breeze. And in the marble bowl the ripples gleam, And through the lindens of the avenue The sifted golden sun comes to us blue And dying, like the sunshine of a dream. Exquisite triflers and deceivers rare, Tender of heart, but little tied by vows, Deliciously we dally 'neath the boughs, And playfully the lovers plague the fair. Receiving, should they overstep a point, A buffet from a hand absurdly small, At which upon a gallant knee they fall To kiss the little finger's littlest joint. And as this is a shocking liberty, A frigid glance rewards the daring swain,— Not quite o'erbalancing with its disdain The red mouth's reassuring clemency.