Baudelaire is a symbol as well as a symptom of the human sickness. This is what happens to a man who has lost his spiritual bearings and expects to find an artificial paradise in drugs, sex and Satanism.  

By CHARLES BAUDELAIRE
Translated from the French
by Lasha Darkmoon

Hymn to Satan

O you among all angels consummate,
God stripped of honor, God betrayed by fate,
Satan, have pity on my long despair!

O Prince of exiles, you who suffered wrong,
Who still undaunted rise up ever strong,
Satan, have pity on my long despair!

You, lord and master of the occult art,
Wise healer of the harrowed human heart,
Satan, have pity on my long despair!

You who, through love, beneath malignant skies,
Give lepers their first taste of paradise,
Satan, have pity on my long despair!

You who, in teaching girls to act like whores,
Bring them to rags and syphilitic sores,
Satan, have pity on my long despair!

You who, on a tall building’s outer ledge,
Propel the sleepwalker toward the edge,
Satan, have pity on my long despair!

You who, to soothe his soul, inspires man
To make the best gunpowder that he can,
Satan, have pity on my long despair!

You who, with death, your darling in delusion,
Invented Hope—that beautiful illusion—
Satan, have pity on my long despair!

O refuge of all who in God’s angry eyes
Have failed the entrance test to paradise,
Satan, have pity on my long despair!

PRAYER

Glory and praise to thee, Satan on high
Who reigned in heaven once, yet vanquished lie
In deepest hell now—plunged in dreams and silence!
Grant that my soul rest one day in thy presence:
There where the Tree of Knowledge spreads its shade,
Building a brave new temple round your head.