Thursday, October 13, 2011

An Obsession with Words...and Arthur Rimbaud

I once saw a film called "Total Eclipse", around the time I was obsessed with Leonardo DiCaprio (and I still might be...who are you to judge, huh?)...nevertheless, I had to see every film he was ever in at the time. So I stayed up late one night, as a teen, and watched the film on cable. It changed my life. It was panned by critics, but it changed my life. After seeing the tortured life of this gifted poet played out on screen by this amazingly talented actor, I started writing poetry, and my life became more about Arthur Rimbaud than of Leonardo Dicaprio. He inspired songs and poetry and love in me that I did not know existed. Rimbaud made me realize that words that come from you can change you. And there are days where I am obsessed with certain words and feel the need to get them out and spend hours writing. It's because of Rimbaud, probably my greatest poetic inspiration...

The poem that changed the way I write and inspired my song "Words to a Page" and my poem "My Cracked Boots"...



My Bohemia (Fantasy)

And so I went, hands thrust in torn pockets.
My coat was more idea than fact.
Beneath the sky – my Muse, my liege- I went;
Oh my what dreams of splendid loves I had!
My one and only trousers were hugely holed
Starry-eyed Tom Thumb, I strewed my path
With verse. I laid my head at Great Bear Inn
My stars swished softly in the sky
And, seated on roadsides, I heard them
On lovely evenings in September, feeling dew
Drop on my face, like invigorating wine;
And rhyming verse among the phantom shadows,
I harp on the laces of  my wounded boots,
One foot by my heart.

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