pin oaks tower
above the sunbaked
sky    clouds snag on
branches tear apart
into shadow-streaked
clumps of white    they
split into patterns
of significance
like newly bought
sheets
of satin

on an L-shaped limb
i see the face of my
muse shredded into
strips of suffering
her eyes are gone
her mouth firmly shut
as always      the font
of inspiration dappled
with dry green moss
plugged as long as
the shreds survive
on the sahara-searing
wind      elongated
tattered rising with
the currents bounding
straight toward
poetry's embrace
straight toward
the infinite
void

rimbaud sits
at the base
of his oak      the giant
gnarled roots shape
an uneasy divot
a place
to rest
he has gagged
his muse
so no sounds escape
her lips
silent
comme habitude  
    to prompt
true poetry first derange
the senses    poetry
sets its own
standards raw elegant
faithful demonic
buried at the base
of the titanic oaks

just as for wittgenstein
words are not enough  
for rimbaud
they scale the moat
of meaning    at the top
only emptiness a missing
moon      whereof
we cannot speak thereof
we must remain silent

rimbaud enfant terrible
of paris'
literary
scene
takes aim at his muse
fires      she falls
to the ground
permanently mute
and he is finished
writing forever    
he abandons
her like a faithless
lover      words taste like
sand      they are symbols
of nothing      difficult
to chew      inadvisable
to swallow
no nutrition
    so the poet
jilts his vocation
traipses
off to ethiopia
to sell guns to any
lowlife buyer
who carries cash      with
poetry exhausted
guns make a life
of danger adventure
worth later losing
a leg to bone
cancer worth later
dying penniless
in marseille
eager to return
to africa to reclaim
his primal homeland

at the base
of the oaks swaying
in the sub-saharan breeze
we dig for the muse's
buried speech
to rimbaud her
reprimand and
prophesy that
words are only
symbols of breath
no one can define
them      they stand
for everything else
they inhale experience
exhale the semblance
of art      senses
do not remain deranged
but come to them-
selves with
desire      what is a leg
a life a legacy of
modernism      what a gun
holstered in the
french-african sun
shining
into the open
wound of the
future which no
poet can wrestle
to the ground
shaded by titanic
oaks towering
above the sky
powerful
yet quiet
as a muse