As the end of the century approaches, all our culture is like flies at the beginning of winter. Having lost their agility, dreamy and demented, they turn slowly about the window in the first icy mists of morning, . . . [then] they fall down the curtains.
Source: Cool Memories, ch. 5, 1987.
-- Charles Baudelaire, (Apr 9 1821-1867), French poet, critic, translator; He was noted for his powerful expressionistic poetry and translation of the tales of Edgar Allan Poe.