The question within the question. Signs are not as separate as they appear to be when we examine them singly. Each sign contributes. The Chinese Notebook is like prose in all respects. Confusion ignites work.
Content is only an excuse, something to permit the writing to occur, to trigger it.
It was the availability of Pound's sources, the books and ideas and experiences, things which he wanted available, that led and permitted so many to disagree with him. Anyone denying the possibility of referentiality is quitting the writing game. Its personality is marked by what is left out because so much has been left in. The definition of poetry is not distorted because you want it to include its contemplation. One can point to the concretist tradition as a partial refutation, or one can point to the great works of Grenier, A Day at the Beach and Sentences, where literature occurs within individual words.