# Femmes damnées (Comme un bétail pensif) · Damned Women (Like a Pensive Herd)

Les Fleurs du mal · Charles Baudelaire · Flowers of Evil

Source: https://1732studios.com/books/baudelaire/femmes-damnees-comme-un-betail-pensif. Data: https://1732studios.com/books/baudelaire/femmes-damnees-comme-un-betail-pensif.json.

**1** Comme un bétail pensif sur le sable couchées,  
Like a pensive herd lying upon the sand,
> «un bétail»: «bétail» (m.) is livestock, a herd of cattle — a deliberately animal, grazing image for the women. The past participle «couchées» (from «coucher», to lay down) is feminine plural, agreeing with the «Elles» that opens the next line — the participial phrase anticipates its subject, so the herd is unmistakably the women themselves.

**2** Elles tournent leurs yeux vers l'horizon des mers,  
They turn their eyes toward the horizon of the seas,

**3** Et leurs pieds se cherchant et leurs mains rapprochées  
And their feet seeking each other and their hands drawn close
> Reciprocal «se cherchant»: «se chercher» here is reciprocal rather than reflexive: the plural «se» means 'each other', so «leurs pieds se cherchant» is 'their feet seeking one another'. «cherchant» is the present participle of «chercher» (to seek). The reciprocal pronoun quietly makes the gesture mutual — a touch between two bodies, not one.

**4** Ont de douces langueurs et des frissons amers.  
Have soft languors and bitter shudders.


**5** Les unes, coeurs épris des longues confidences,  
Some, hearts enamored of long confidences,
> «épris de»: «épris» is the past participle of the literary verb «s'éprendre» (to fall in love), used as an adjective: 'enamored of, taken with'. It governs «de» before its object: «épris des longues confidences» = 'enamored of long, intimate exchanges'. «Les unes ... d'autres ...» across the stanzas means 'some ... others ...', sorting the women into types.

**6** Dans le fond des bosquets où jasent les ruisseaux,  
In the depths of the groves where the brooks chatter,

**7** Vont épelant l'amour des craintives enfances  
Go spelling out the love of timid childhoods
> «aller» + present participle: «aller» followed by a present participle is an old, literary construction expressing a continuous, drawn-out action: «vont épelant» = 'go on spelling out, keep slowly spelling out'. «épeler» literally means to spell a word letter by letter, so the women painstakingly sound out a love that belongs to «craintives enfances», timid childhoods.

**8** Et creusent le bois vert des jeunes arbrisseaux;  
And carve into the green wood of young saplings;


**9** D'autres, comme des soeurs, marchent lentes et graves  
Others, like sisters, walk slow and grave

**10** À travers les rochers pleins d'apparitions,  
Across the rocks full of apparitions,

**11** Où saint Antoine a vu surgir comme des laves  
Where Saint Anthony saw rise up like lava

**12** Les seins nus et pourprés de ses tentations;  
The bare, crimsoned breasts of his temptations;


**13** Il en est, aux lueurs des résines croulantes,  
There are some, by the glow of crumbling resin-torches,
> «il en est» = 'there are some': «il en est» is a literary, impersonal turn meaning 'there are some (of them)' — equivalent to «il y en a». The «en» stands in for 'of these women'. It mirrors the «les unes ... d'autres ... il en est ... et d'autres» catalogue threading the poem, each phrase introducing another kind of damned woman.

**14** Qui dans le creux muet des vieux antres païens  
Who in the mute hollow of old pagan caverns

**15** T'appellent au secours de leurs fièvres hurlantes,  
Call on you to the rescue of their howling fevers,

**16** Ô Bacchus, endormeur des remords anciens!  
O Bacchus, luller of ancient remorse!
> «Bacchus, endormeur»: Bacchus is the Roman god of wine and ecstatic abandon, invoked here in the vocative «Ô Bacchus». «endormeur» is an agent noun coined from «endormir» (to put to sleep, to lull): the 'luller / souther' of «remords anciens», old remorse — wine that drowns guilt. The «t'» of the previous line addresses him directly.


**17** Et d'autres, dont la gorge aime les scapulaires,  
And others, whose breast loves the scapulars,
> «les scapulaires»: A «scapulaire» is a scapular — two small cloth squares joined by cords and worn against the chest as a Catholic devotional. That the «gorge» (breast, throat) 'loves' it sets piety directly on the skin, so the next lines' hidden whip («un fouet») turns devotion into penitential pleasure.

**18** Qui, recélant un fouet sous leurs longs vêtements,  
Who, hiding a whip beneath their long garments,
> «recéler»: «recéler» means to conceal, to harbor — often with the legal nuance of hiding stolen or illicit goods. The present participle «recélant un fouet» ('concealing a whip') makes the hidden object faintly criminal, smuggled under the «longs vêtements». «un fouet» is a whip, the instrument of the flagellant blending pain and devotion.

**19** Mêlent, dans le bois sombre et les nuits solitaires,  
Mingle, in the dark wood and the solitary nights,

**20** L'écume du plaisir aux larmes des tourments.  
The foam of pleasure with the tears of torments.
> «mêler qqch. à qqch.»: «mêler A à B» means 'to mingle A with B'; the second element takes «à» (here contracted to «aux larmes»). So «mêlent l'écume du plaisir aux larmes des tourments» = 'mingle the foam of pleasure with the tears of torments'. The verb «mêlent» governs the whole sentence across the line break from «Mêlent» (s5-l3).


**21** Ô vierges, ô démons, ô monstres, ô martyres,  
O virgins, O demons, O monsters, O martyrs,

**22** De la réalité grands esprits contempteurs,  
Great spirits scornful of reality,
> «contempteurs» and the inversion: «contempteur» is a rare, elevated noun (from Latin «contemptor») meaning a despiser or scorner. The phrase inverts normal order — literally 'of reality great spirits scorners' — so «de la réalité» belongs to «contempteurs»: 'great spirits, scorners of reality'. Verse routinely fronts the complement like this for rhythm and rhyme.

**23** Chercheuses d'infini, dévotes et satyres,  
Seekers of the infinite, devout women and satyrs,

**24** Tantôt pleines de cris, tantôt pleines de pleurs,  
Now full of cries, now full of tears,
> «tantôt ... tantôt»: The paired adverb «tantôt ... tantôt» means 'now ... now / sometimes ... sometimes', marking alternation between two states. Here it swings the women between «cris» (cries, screams) and «pleurs» (weeping). «pleurs» is a literary plural noun for tears/weeping, distinct from the verb «pleurer».


**25** Vous que dans votre enfer mon âme a poursuivies,  
You whom my soul has pursued into your hell,
> Past-participle agreement with «que»: In the passé composé with «avoir», the participle agrees with a direct object that comes before it. The object pronoun «que» (= «vous», the women) precedes «a poursuivies», so the participle takes the feminine plural «-ies»: «mon âme a poursuivies» = 'my soul has pursued [them]'. The fronted «Vous que...» sets up the poet's final address.

**26** Pauvres soeurs, je vous aime autant que je vous plains,  
Poor sisters, I love you as much as I pity you,
> «plaindre»: «plaindre quelqu'un» is 'to pity someone, to feel sorry for them'; «je vous plains» = 'I pity you'. The «autant que» ('as much as') balances it against «je vous aime», 'I love you' — the poem's closing equation of love and pity. Do not confuse it with the pronominal «se plaindre» ('to complain').

**27** Pour vos mornes douleurs, vos soifs inassouvies,  
For your dreary sorrows, your unslaked thirsts,
> «inassouvi»: «inassouvi» means unsatisfied, unslaked, never sated — from «assouvir» (to satisfy a hunger or thirst) with the negating prefix «in-». «vos soifs inassouvies» = 'your thirsts that can never be quenched', the perpetual craving that defines the damned. «morne» (dreary, bleak, dull) colors «douleurs» with the same exhausted gloom.

**28** Et les urnes d'amour dont vos grands coeurs sont pleins.  
And the urns of love with which your great hearts are full.
> «dont» with «plein de»: «plein de» means 'full of', and «dont» is the relative pronoun standing in for «de + antecedent». So «les urnes d'amour dont vos grands coeurs sont pleins» = 'the urns of love with which your great hearts are full'. «dont» neatly absorbs the «de» that «plein» requires — a single relative carrying the whole 'full of' construction.

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Source text: public domain (Charles Baudelaire, d. 1867). English translation: © 2026 1732 Studios, LLC — original draft, pending editorial review.