One of the prose poems I wrote to fulfill an exercise in my prose poetry workshop was an "after" poem, one that responds to another poem. I have been wary of these. If the reader doesn't know the original, much of the import of the "after" poem is lost. Also, who am I to respond to another poet's work? And what if the "after" poem is just using the original as a sort of crutch, leaning on the language and ideas of another creator? Relatedly, how is one to know how closely to stick to the original?
I still believe all these misgivings are valid concerns, but seeing as how it was just an exercise, I put them aside and went blithely ahead with almost the first work I came across in my internet search--Baudelaire's "Be Drunk," which I have now read in French and several English translations. Although it goes without saying that Baudelaire is a poetic giant compared to me, I did feel that it was possible to rationally disagree with some aspects of his recommendation to "be drunk," even while appreciating the validity of his insistence that it is important to be absorbed in one's passions, whatever these may be. Or, to put it another way, I saw that sobriety can be passionate as well and expressed that.
Fast forward a few weeks, and David L O'Nan, Editor, creator, and purveyor of Fevers of the Mind, launched a "poems inspired by Baudelaire" topic on his site. I had just the thing, and you can read Sober Up! there and check out some others while you are at it. Thanks, David!
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