Thank you Maria,
what a wonderful example to absorb. Another keeper. I have attempted to
write a poem about how neon lights at night as in a big city hide the
secrets of the day. I am now wondering if I can attempt (after) I have begun
to grasp this new style to incorporate what I have done and expand on it
using windows as a guide without being plagerous of course only style. (?)
How nice to hear from you..Joanne
----- Original Message -----
From: "Tidemark Design" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Saturday, May 12, 2001 6:09 AM
Subject: Re: prose poem
> Hi Joanne,
>
> Some background info on the possible origins of the prose poem:
>
> Aloysius Bertrand (1807 - 41) may have established the prose poem as a
genre with the publication of "Gaspard de la nuit" in 1842.
>
> Later, Baudelaire - influenced by both Bertrand and Poe - produced "Le
Spleen de Paris" (published posthumously in 1869) from which the following
is taken:
>
> Windows
>
> A man looking out of an open window never sees as much as
> the same man looking directly at a closed window. There is no
> object more deeply mysterious, no object more pregnant with
> suggestion, more insidiously sinister, in short more truly
> dazzling than a window lit up from within by even a single
> candle. What we can see out in the sunlight is always less
> interesting than what we can perceive taking place behind a
> pane of windowglass. In that pit, in that blackness or
> brightness, life is being lived, life is suffering, life is
> dreaming....
> Above the wave-crests of the rooftops across the way I
> can see a middle-aged woman, face already wrinkled--a poor
> woman forever bending over something, who never seems to
> leave her room. From just her face and her dress, from
> practically nothing at all, I've re-created this woman's story,
> or rather her legend; and sometimes I weep while reciting it to
> myself.
> Some poor old man would have sufficed just as well; I
> could with equal ease have invented a legend for him, too.
> And so I go to bed with a certain pride, having lived and
> suffered for others than myself.
> Of course, you may confront me with: "But are you sure
> your story is really the true and right one?" But what does it
> really matter what the reality outside myself is, as long as it
> has helped me to live, to feel that I am alive, to feel the very
> nature of the creature that I am.
>
> regards,
>
> maria
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