Charles Bau·de·laire

Always be a poet, even in prose.

One should always be drunk. That's all that matters...But with what? With wine, with poetry, or with virtue, as you chose. But get drunk.

The beautiful is always bizarre.

If the word doesn't exist, invent it; but first be sure it doesn't exist.

Extract the eternal from the ephemeral.

Charles Baudelaire was a French poet born on April 9, 1821, in Paris, France. His works primarily on Les Fleurs du mal (1857; The Flowers of Evil), were amongst the most prominent poetry collections published in Europe in the 19th century. Also, his Petits poèmes en prose (1868; “Little Prose Poems”) was arguably the most victorious early experimental literature in prose poetry of the 19th century.