Vowels

A black, E white, I red, U green, O blue: vowels,
I shall tell your latent births some day:
A, hairy black corset of shining flies
Buzzing around stenches cruel,

Gulfs of dark; E, candors of tents and vapors,
Proud glacier lances, white kings, quivering umbels;
I, purples, spat blood, laughter of lips beautiful
In anger or penitent drunkennesses;

U, cycles, divine vibrating of seas viridian,
Peace of grazings strewn with animals, peace of wrinkles
Alchemy stamps on great studious brows;

O, supreme Clarion full of stridors strange,
Silences crossed by Worlds and Angels
—O Omega, violet beam of His Eyes!

 

Arthur Rimbaud