Ezra, © Janet Kenny

Life and Art

Poets who confuse life and art often make a mess of both.
      —Christian Wiman (Poetry, January 1999)

At the country villa of a respected art patron,
aging, weak-sighted Baudelaire
attempted to step into a large impressionist landscape.
The painting was ruined and the poet, never invited back,
died penniless and alone a few short years later.

Ezra Pound, visiting the Teatro dell'Opera
following one of his radio addresses,
rushed the stage to save Desdemona
just as Verdi's Otello reached its climax,
disrupting the performance and badly spraining his ankle.

The British loss of Khartoum has been blamed on one Henry Frobisher,
who never sent a January 1885 dispatch
informing Gen. Wolseley of the increasingly dire situation.
Drafts found among the aide-de-camp's papers suggest this omission
resulted from his inability to find a suitable rhyme for "regiments."

© Max Gutmann

"Life and Art" previously appeared in RE:AL.