Paul Verlaine

Abstractions are weak against realities, things that have happened may change men but they cannot vanquish them. So far everything has been only inchoate power and a foreshadowing threat, but not enchantment

His acute ear heard the oracle which foretold his destiny, but he did not know how to interpret what the Pythian voice had whispered until everything was fulfilled

If poetry is so understood, the boy who wrote the Poèmes Saturniens on his school benches, already saw the reality of life and even the future mask