Poet and Princess

Melissa and Maya are away this week in Miami visiting with the Honduran/American sides of her family: parents, grandparents, family, list of girlfriends, Melissa's parents place in Broward. As I'm working, I was unable to take off but I have been able to catch up on a little night reading. Here's detail of a profile of the young Arthur Rimbaud by Henri Fantin-Latour, "Un Coin de Table", 1872. Rimbaud's got that dreamy look in his eyes - young poet. This painting's kept at the Musee d'Orsay in Paris - I've never been but hope one day I will have the chance to visit - hopefully with Maya.

While Melissa and Maya have been away, I've had a chance to finish a book about Rimbaud, Henry Miller's Time of the Assassins. Essentially, its a tribute. Miller's take on Rimbaud, what happened in Rimbaud's last 19 years after he left poetry at 18(!): gun runner, Abyssinia, mercenary, carrier of a belt of gold coins, dyssentry - man of the world. Its a fascinating take, le monde moderne. It brought up memories when I was living in New York, a more bohemian lifestyle - NYU graduate student - the village. It also got me thinking about my daughter, her bright eyes, smiling face, morning, future possibilities and concerns. If one day Maya finds this entry when she's a little older, she might wonder why her old father read Miller's take on Rimbaud.

Here's a latin verse that's also haunted me this past week. The reference is not the mass but Miami bookstacks, mathematician's musings, themepark engineering, Stanislaus Ulam, his old friend John Von Neumann:

Judex ergo cum sedebit,
quid quid latet apparebit:
nil inultum remanebit.

Quid sum miser tunc dicturus?
Quem patronum rogaturus,
cum vix justus sit securus?

Semaphore into the future, Maya.