Three Septembers
September 1871, September 1872
Septembers are the fateful months for falls.
Septembers, not quite autumn yet, will start
The way. They do not mean to hear the calls
Of destiny, but there it is. They part
The summer from its certain leaves and oaths
From fixity. Septembers are the space
Where freshness tilts to wane. They put on clothes
Which are not green or yellow but a place
Between the two. Vowed mirrors crack. Taboo
To thrills, young fatherhood becomes a bore.
Flash passion flares up and renders the coup
De grâce. Adventure leaps from shore to shore
Of loves abandoned and embraced, a leaf
That leans towards bonfires and chilled grief.
The Dim Sea
The following September Paul was in
The Petits Carmes and Rimbaud was involved
In printing Une Saison en enfer. Spin
It as you may, September had revolved
To total disaster. Arthur was trapped
Behind the bars of literary taste,
Inside a cell Paris poets had slapped
Around him. Shit stained, Rimbaud had erased
All chance of anything but rejection.
These locked him with indifference to his much
Self-vaunted genius. They saw infection
From Paul’s gut, kept the bunny in the hutch
Of rural exile. He had built his jail.
Paul turned inward to Christ. Arthur set sail
To nobodyness.