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MARQUIS DE SADE by ANDRE BRETON

Poem Explanation Poet Analysis

First Line: THE MARQUIS DE SADE HAS GONE BACK INSIDE THE ERUPTING VOLCANO
Last Line: CLINGING TO THE VIRGIN GOSSAMER OF DESIRE
Subject(s): SADE, MARQUIS DE (1740-1814);

The Marquis de Sade has gone back inside the erupting volcano
From which he had come
With his beautiful hands in ruffled cuffs
His girlish eyes
And that mentality on the edge of headlong flight which was
His alone
But from the phosphorescent salon with visceral lamps
He has not ceased to hurl mysterious orders
'That open a breach in the moral night
'Through that breach I see
The great cracking shadows the old rotten bark
Dissolve
Allowing me to love you
As the first man loved the first woman
In complete freedom
That freedom
For which fire itself became man
For which the Marquis de Sade defied the centuries with his great
abstract trees
With tragic acrobats
Clinging to the gossamer thread of desire




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