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Duellum

Topics: classic

Two warriors have grappled, and their arms     Have flecked the air with blood and flashing steel.     These frolics, this mad clanking, these alarms     Proceed from childish love's frantic appeal.     The swords are broken! like our youthful life     My dear! But tooth and nail, avid and sharp,     Soon fill the place of rapier and knife.     0 bitter heat of love, o cankered hearts!     In a ravine haunted by catlike forms     These two have tumbled, struggling to the end;     Shreds of their skin will bloom on arid thorns.     This pit is Hell, its denizens our friends!     Amazon, let us roll there guiltlessly     In spiteful fervour, for eternity!

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"Two warriors have grappled, and their arms..."

Charles Baudelaire's contribution to classic is further solidified by the brilliance found in "Duellum"... ### Why We Love This Line At Linespedia, we believe that poetry is the ultimate sanctuary for the soul...

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"The Text is taken from Percy's Reliques (1765), vol. i. p. 71, 'given from two MS. copies, transmitted from Scotland.' Herd had a very similar bal"

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"Je suis comme le roi dun pays pluvieux,     Riche..."

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