CATS -- Charles Baudelaire (trans. Richard Howard)

[transemacabre.livejournal.com]

Lovers, scholars -- the fervent, the austere --
grow equally fond of cats, their household pride.
As sensitive as either to the cold,
as sedentary, though so strong and sleek,

your cat, a friend to learning and to love,
seeks out both silence and the awesome dark...
Hell would have made the cat its courier
could it have controverted feline pride!

Dozing, all cats assume the svelte design
of desert sphinxes sprawled in solitude,
apparently transfixed by endless dreams;

their teeming loins are rich in magic sparks,
and golden specks like infinitesmal sand
glisten in those enigmatic eyes.