With quiet heart, I climbed the hill, <br />from which one can see, the city, complete, <br />hospitals, brothels, purgatory, hell, <br />prison, where every sin flowers, at our feet. <br />You know well, Satan, patron of my distress, <br />I did not trudge up there to vainly weep, <br />but like an old man with an old mistress, <br />I longed to intoxicate myself, with the infernal delight <br />of the vast procuress, who can always make things fresh. <br />Whether you still sleep in the morning light, <br />heavy, dark, rheumatic, or whether your hands <br />flutter, in your pure, gold-edged veils of night, <br />I love you, infamous capital! Courtesans <br />and pimps, you often offer pleasures <br />the vulgar mob will never understand.<br /><br />Charles Baudelaire<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/epilogue-24/
