The Burning of a Masterpiece
On the easel of my horizon
Monet was painting
an autumn twilight,
but I watched as smoke
gray fingers
smeared his pastel
and my visions wisp-ed away
a god spoke of burning
the testament of life,
every single letter
of every verse,
now?
they feather to ash
on the breeze,
I burnt them,
I woke yester-year
with a poet in residence,
but today, today?
I awoke the scribbler
living on the nothing
of me
before each page
passed over the flames
and consumed in the
reaching fingers of black,
melting to mould
each strip of my flesh,
I close my eyes
and feel the ridge
of a word, a letter
I allowed them
to sear my palms,
I brush caked salt
from the corner
of my mouth,
as I handed each poem
to a quick death,
I read the Misery
of each page
that flares,
those black fingers
now curl black strips
of my mantel,
like scrapping paint
flaccid but not broken,
I pick at a piece of ash
in hopes of piecing,
a poet back together
but Monet has left
and I can only sketch
in the charcoal
with a god,
whispering in my ear,
that I must burn for nothing
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