the life of the poet/writer

[revolutionR]

if I think about the life of the poets and writers I read
and I have followed and read a lot of them in mine
it would overwhelm me on all levels, take Rimbaud
who was my first favorite poet, who was an amazing
poet, but he got into all sorts of trouble, he stopped
writing poetry in his early twenties and became a gun
runner in Africa, he died at the age of 37 1891 because he had
to have his leg amputated

Then there is the phenomenal Isidore Ducasse who called
himself Lautreamont, who wrote the fantastic novel
Les Chants de Maldoror published in 1886 and he died
in a hotel room in 1870 at the age of 24 of unknown causes
probably of drug related perhaps

there was the surrealist poet Rene' Crevel that committed suicide
but there is a long list of poets that did so also, an other surrealist
poet died in a German concentration camp, Robert Desnos
Antonin Artaud ended his days in a insane asylum
Garcia Lorca was murdered by fascists

and Jack Kerouac drank himself to death
the Beat writer that influenced a generation to ride the wild ride
and live like a writer and maybe contemplate some zen
in any case the life of a poet/writer my be interesting
but we tend to write on our bodies what we write on the page
it goes with the territory because we see and say things
that only we can,and we don't live in a forgiving world

not all poets/writers die young but some of them do
Bukowski was a notorious drinker died at 73
William Burroughs who was a heroin addict mostly died at 83
Philip Lamantia the famous surrealist was 77 he drank a lot of coffee