Henry’s Roundabout Elegy For Cesar Vallejo

Shelley threw up water,
Keats coughed up blood,
Sylvia smelled of gas for months.

Hart Crane went swimming forever,
Weldon Kees paralleled parked on the Golden Gate Bridge,
Lowell never made it to his final destination,

Mandelstam lies frozen in Siberia,
Mayakovsky pulled trousers from the clouds,
Pasternak hung a bow-tie around his own neck,

Dario declared himself poetic dictator of Nicaragua,
Neruda ate his Isla Negra with chili
and Vallejo would have gladly eaten garabage.