An Introduction to French Poetry: Artaud

ALL WRITING IS GARBAGE,
according to Artaud, the madman,
and the older I get, the more I agree;
Chaucer, Shakespeare, Goethe...pick one:
It's all refuse, debris,
spilling from the mind of man,
chasing God's imagination
(we'll never catch up...trust me),
leading, at best, to models of DNA,
or atoms,
houses built with the spokes and wheels
of  Tinker Toys, Lego worlds,
where descriptions don't adequately describe,
explanations fail to explain,
and dialog is as wooden
as the First Lady's face,
there staring from a pike,
the clarity of her character development
as hopeless as Modigliani eyes.
It's garbage.
PEOPLE WHO COME OUT OF NOWHERE AND TRY TO PUT INTO WORDS
ANY PART OF WHAT GOES ON IN THEIR MINDS ARE PIGS.
That offends me, but still,
THE LITERARY SCENE TODAY IS A PIGPEN.
I didn't say it, he did,
 but then,
Antonin Artaud was a madman,
and yet,
even our own sweet Emily,
with downcast eyes, whispered,
"Much madness is divinest sense."

(August 1986)