between good and evil, but this struggle also is a force which keeps the human being very alive emotionally and psychologically.
Baudelaire was a poet well-known for his extravagant life-style. He sought excitement and pleasure, and he was apparently willing to pay the price for those pursuits. The price can be seen in this poem in which the soul of the speaker is tortured by the spiritual struggle.
The speaker is caught in the midst of what he sees as a battle for his mind, his soul, and his body---a battle between good and evil, between God and the "Demon." There is no resolution to this battle in the poem. The poet sees himself as a helpless victim of this struggle between the powers of good and evil.
This declaration should be more shocking to the reader than any image of horror thrown by the poet into the reader's face. Certainly a modern reader would feel d
...