RIMBSHOT

When he was 19 Rimbaud
Decided he was done with poems.
To prove he was in earnest
He bought a revolver
Threatening to shoot
Any poem which approached
And asked him to write it.
Having achieved no consummation
His unwritten poetry
Lingers. Tourists report seeing it
On gray-green nights
Throwing rocks into the River Seine.

IN WAITING

Rimbaud escaped the poems
Besieging him in Paris
But found them waiting
At Java, Aden, Harrar.
From spite, he ignored them.
Some of them linger still;
The more sinister muses
Always seem to have a few
Tucked away somewhere.