# Hymne à la Beauté · Hymn to Beauty

Les Fleurs du mal · Charles Baudelaire · Spleen and Ideal

Source: https://1732studios.com/books/baudelaire/hymne-a-la-beaute. Data: https://1732studios.com/books/baudelaire/hymne-a-la-beaute.json.

**1** Viens-tu du ciel profond ou sors-tu de l'abîme,  
Do you come from the deep sky or rise out of the abyss,
> Inverted question + «sortir de»: Both verbs use subject-verb inversion to ask a question: «viens-tu» = 'do you come', «sors-tu» = 'do you come out / rise'. «sortir de» means 'to come out of, to emerge from'. The line poses Beauty's origin as a single either/or — heaven «du ciel profond» or hell «de l'abîme» — that the whole poem will refuse to settle.

**2** O Beauté? ton regard, infernal et divin,  
O Beauty? your gaze, infernal and divine,

**3** Verse confusément le bienfait et le crime,  
Pours out, all mingled, both the blessing and the crime,
> «confusément» — indistinctly, mingled: «confusément» = 'confusedly, indistinctly, all jumbled together'. Beauty's gaze «verse confusément le bienfait et le crime» — pours out kindness and crime without separating them. The adverb is the moral core of the hymn: good and evil come from her as one undivided stream.

**4** Et l'on peut pour cela te comparer au vin.  
And for that one may compare you to wine.


**5** Tu contiens dans ton oeil le couchant et l'aurore;  
You hold within your eye the sunset and the dawn;

**6** Tu répands des parfums comme un soir orageux;  
You spread out perfumes like a stormy evening;

**7** Tes baisers sont un philtre et ta bouche une amphore  
Your kisses are a love-potion and your mouth an amphora
> «philtre» and «amphore»: «un philtre» is a magic potion, especially a love-philtre that bewitches whoever drinks it; «une amphore» is the two-handled ancient jar used for wine. Both keep the line's intoxication imagery — Beauty's kiss is a spell, her mouth the vessel that pours it — extending the comparison «au vin» from the first stanza.

**8** Qui font le héros lâche et l'enfant courageux.  
That make the hero a coward and the child brave.


**9** Sors-tu du gouffre noir ou descends-tu des astres?  
Do you rise from the black gulf or descend from the stars?

**10** Le Destin charmé suit tes jupons comme un chien;  
Spellbound, Destiny follows your skirts like a dog;
> «charmé» — bewitched, under a spell: «charmé» (past participle of «charmer») keeps its strong older sense here: not merely 'charmed / pleased' but 'enchanted, put under a spell'. «Le Destin charmé suit tes jupons» — even Fate, bewitched, trots at Beauty's heels «comme un chien», like a dog, mastered by her.

**11** Tu sèmes au hasard la joie et les désastres,  
You scatter at random both the joy and the disasters,

**12** Et tu gouvernes tout et ne réponds de rien.  
And you govern everything and answer for nothing.
> «répondre de» — to answer for: «répondre de qch» = 'to answer for, to be accountable for something' (distinct from «répondre à», 'to reply to'). «tu ne réponds de rien» = 'you are accountable for nothing'. The line states Beauty's amorality flatly: total power «tu gouvernes tout», zero responsibility.


**13** Tu marches sur des morts, Beauté, dont tu te moques;  
You walk upon the dead, Beauty, whom you mock;
> «se moquer de» + relative «dont»: «se moquer de qn» is the pronominal verb 'to mock, to make fun of someone', always built with «de». Because the verb governs «de», the relative pronoun is «dont» ('of whom'): «des morts dont tu te moques» = 'the dead whom you mock'. Beauty tramples the dead and laughs at them in the same breath.

**14** De tes bijoux l'Horreur n'est pas le moins charmant,  
Of your jewels, Horror is not the least charming,

**15** Et le Meurtre, parmi tes plus chères breloques,  
And Murder, among your dearest trinkets,
> «une breloque» — a charm, a trinket: «une breloque» is a small ornamental charm, the kind dangled from a watch-chain or bracelet. Naming «le Meurtre» — Murder — as one of Beauty's «plus chères breloques», her dearest trinkets, turns horror into jewelry: she wears crime as a charm and dances with it «amoureusement» in the next line.

**16** Sur ton ventre orgueilleux danse amoureusement.  
Dances lovingly upon your prideful belly.


**17** L'éphémère ébloui vole vers toi, chandelle,  
The dazzled mayfly flies toward you, candle,
> «l'éphémère» — the mayfly: As a noun «un éphémère» is the mayfly — the insect that lives only a day. «L'éphémère ébloui» is the moth-like creature drawn to Beauty as to a flame («chandelle»): it «crépite, flambe» — crackles and blazes — and blesses the very fire that destroys it. The word also carries its ordinary sense, 'the ephemeral, the short-lived', so it names mortal man as well.

**18** Crépite, flambe et dit: Bénissons ce flambeau!  
Crackles, blazes, and says: Let us bless this torch!

**19** L'amoureux pantelant incliné sur sa belle  
The panting lover bent over his beloved

**20** A l'air d'un moribond caressant son tombeau.  
Has the look of a dying man caressing his tomb.


**21** Que tu viennes du ciel ou de l'enfer, qu'importe,  
Whether you come from heaven or from hell, what does it matter,
> Concessive «que» + subjunctive: «viennes» is the present subjunctive of «venir». Opening a clause with «que… ou…» plus the subjunctive forms a concession: «que tu viennes du ciel ou de l'enfer» = 'whether you come from heaven or from hell'. Paired with «qu'importe» ('what does it matter'), it waves the whole question of origin aside — the poet no longer cares which.

**22** Ô Beauté! monstre énorme, effrayant, ingénu!  
O Beauty! monster enormous, terrifying, ingenuous!
> «ingénu» — artless, innocent: «ingénu» means 'artless, naive, innocent' — guileless rather than 'ingenious'. Set against «monstre énorme, effrayant», it is a shock: Beauty is a vast, terrifying monster and yet innocent of it all, dealing out good and evil «confusément» without malice or design. The contradiction is the point of the whole hymn.

**23** Si ton oeil, ton souris, ton pied, m'ouvrent la porte  
If your eye, your smile, your foot, open for me the door
> «le souris» — a smile (archaic): «un souris» (masculine) is the old poetic noun for a smile, where modern French uses «le sourire». Here «ton souris» = 'your smile'; it has nothing to do with the homonym «la souris» (the mouse). Baudelaire keeps the archaic form for its grace, listing eye, smile, and foot as the parts of Beauty that unlock the «Infini».

**24** D'un Infini que j'aime et n'ai jamais connu?  
Of an Infinite that I love and have never known?


**25** De Satan ou de Dieu, qu'importe? Ange ou Sirène,  
From Satan or from God, what does it matter? Angel or Siren,

**26** Qu'importe, si tu rends, — fée aux yeux de velours,  
What does it matter, if you make — fairy with eyes of velvet,
> «rendre» + adjective — to make (something) X: «rendre» + a direct object + an adjective means 'to make (something) become X'. The object and adjective wait until the final stanza: «si tu rends … l'univers moins hideux et les instants moins lourds» = 'if you make the universe less hideous and the moments less heavy'. The dashes hold an aside — «fée aux yeux de velours… ô mon unique reine!» — across two lines before the sentence completes.

**27** Rythme, parfum, lueur, ô mon unique reine! —  
Rhythm, perfume, glimmer, O my one and only queen! —

**28** L'univers moins hideux et les instants moins lourds?  
The universe less hideous and the moments less heavy?

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