The supposed inspiration for this Dorothy Tanning painting.

A Voyage to Cythera by Charles Baudelaire

My heart like a bird was fluttering joyously 
And soaring freely around the rigging; 
Beneath a cloudless sky the ship was rolling 
Like an angel drunken with the radiant sun.

What is this black, gloomy island? — It's Cythera, 
They tell us, a country celebrated in song, 
The banal Eldorado of old bachelors. 
Look at it; after all, it is a wretched land.

— Island of sweet secrets, of the heart's festivals!
The beautiful shade of ancient Venus 
Hovers above your seas like a perfume 
And fills all minds with love and languidness.

Fair isle of green myrtle filled with full-blown flowers
Ever venerated by all nations,
Where the sighs of hearts in adoration
Roll like incense over a garden of roses

Or like the eternal cooing of wood-pigeons!
— Cythera was now no more than the barrenest land,
A rocky desert disturbed by shrill cries.
But I caught a glimpse of a singular object!

It was not a temple in the shade of a grove 
Where the youthful priestess, amorous of flowers, 
Was walking, her body hot with hidden passion, 
Half-opening her robe to the passing breezes;

But behold! as we passed, hugging the shore 
So that we disturbed the birds with our white sails, 
We saw it was a gallows with three arms 
Outlined in black like a cypress against the sky.

Ferocious birds perched on their feast were savagely 
Destroying the ripe corpse of a hanged man; 
Each plunged his filthy beak as though it were a tool 
Into every corner of that bloody putrescence;

The eyes were two holes and from the gutted belly 
The heavy intestines hung down along his thighs 
And his torturers, gorged with hideous delights, 
Had completely castrated him with their sharp beaks.

Below his feet a pack of jealous quadrupeds 
Prowled with upraised muzzles and circled round and round; 
One beast, larger than the others, moved in their midst 
Like a hangman surrounded by his aides.

Cytherean, child of a sky so beautiful, 
You endured those insults in silence 
To expiate your infamous adorations 
And the sins which denied to you a grave.

Ridiculous hanged man, your sufferings are mine! 
I felt at the sight of your dangling limbs 
The long, bitter river of my ancient sorrows 
Rise up once more like vomit to my teeth;

Before you, poor devil of such dear memory 
I felt all the stabbing beaks of the crows 
And the jaws of the black panthers who loved so much 
In other days to tear my flesh to shreds.

— The sky was charming and the sea was smooth; 
For me thenceforth all was black and bloody, 
Alas! and I had in that allegory 
Wrapped up my heart as in a heavy shroud.

On your isle, O Venus! I found upright only 
A symbolic gallows from which hung my image...
O! Lord! give me the strength and the courage 
To contemplate my body and soul without loathing!