the divorced, the mad, the
ladies of the
streets.
I always became the best
at things when those things
no longer counted:
football, high-speed driving,
drinking, gambling, clowning,
debating, bullshitting, going
to jail, going crazy, lifting
weights, shadow boxing with
fate.
but I was alone.
the others had become sedate,
had become responsible
citizens with
children, jobs, mortgages,
life insurance and pet
dogs.
the very things which terrorized
me.
I was the retarded child
still looking for more
childhood.
I still wanted to play but
there were no
playmates.
I bummed the country,
prowled the avenues,
the bars.
I found nothing, I
found
nobody.
I searched the skid
rows
thinking that something
could be hiding
there.
I thought
wrong.
being a late starter
also makes you late for heaven
or hell,
you are always trying to
catch something,
catch up to something,
some tangent, some
invisible thing,
it has to be there,
I can feel it there,
I see it sometimes in the eyes
of a tired old waitress,
or the round spot on a pillow
where the cat has
slept.
it’s there and it beats the
funeral parlors
and the millions of feet
walking in their
shoes
and the way it seems to
be,
the cities, the faces, the
newspapers, the sidewalks,
the stop signs, the churches,
the flags and the
calendars, the whole
unholy act.
this childhood on the
hunt,
this late starter,
this slugger, this drunkard
is still on the
look-out
and I know it’s there,
unfound,
waiting,
centuries late,
boiling,
swirling,
I’ve got the fix on
it,
it’s coming into
focus,
don’t you almost feel it
now?
I do.
barstool
the longer I live the more I realize
that I knew exactly what I was doing
when I didn’t seem to be doing
anything
but watching a wet fly on the
bar
nuzzling a pool of
spilled beer.
I was quitting the game,
tossing in my hand
early,
it felt grand, I tell you,
it even felt dramatic, I mean
to cough it up and out,
to give way,
to sit there
the dirty Venetian blinds
behind me,
nothing to do but get my
wits up enough
to cage another free
drink.
I had zeroed out, I was
the Grand Marshal of
Nowhere,
still young,
I realized that there was
no place to go,
ever,
I was already there.
I was the Clown of the
Patrons.
I was the Nut.
I was the Heart of a
Heartless bar.
the drinks came.
the days and nights
went.
the years went.
I lived by my addled
crushed wits,
sometimes
ended up bloodied in
some alley, given up
for dead,
only to rise again.
I knew exactly what I
was doing: I was
doing nothing.
because I knew there
was nothing
to do.
I know now
that I knew then all that there
was to
know,
and tonight
sitting alone here,
nobody about,
I am still fixed in this
floating
perfect
aspect.
my wits have gotten me
from nowhere to
nowhere
and death like life
is lacking,
and I know so well
I did right
watching that fly
nuzzle the beer
suds
as the others
hustled their butts,
circled in the
tenebrous
light.
look back, look up
was Celine married?
did Hemingway have 6
cats?
why did Bogart smoke
himself to
death?
was Ty Cobb as mean
as they claim?
whatever happened to
Clark Gable’s
ears?
did Van Gogh ever
ice skate?
where were you in
1929?
Nijinski was a
madman.
remember Admiral
Byrd?
Joe Louis was a
cobra.
remember a-dime-a-
dance?
Pearl Harbor?
Mutt and Jeff?
The Katzenjammer
Kids?
gluing together
balsa wood
airplanes?
a bagful
of candy for
7 cents?
remember the
iceman?
Slapsy Maxy
Rosenbloom?
garter belts?
garters?
all night movies?
marathon dance
contests?
Al Jolson?
Mickey Walker?
a nickel beer?
a nickel phone call?
a 3 cent stamp?
Primo Carnera?
a good ten cent
cigar?
Bull Durham?
fuse boxes?
ice boxes?
the ruler against
the open
palm?
the Indian head
penny?
Tom Mix?
Buck Rogers?
jaw breakers?
the WPA?
the NRA?
Jack Benny?
the Hit Parade?
movie houses with
cigarettes called
Wings?
zoot suiters?
geeks?
grandmothers who
baked apple
pies?
gold-fish-eating
contests?
Red Grange?
the Babe holding
out for
80 grand?
Man of War?
flagpole-sitting
marathons?
I could go on
and on…
but, Christ, if
you remember
all of these things
you must be
at least as old
as I am.
list
ing these things
on my
Macintosh
computer
with a 50-50 shot
of seeing the
21st
century,
betting the horse
instead of
riding it,
we’re lucky to be
here and we’ll
be lucky when we
leave.
see you in
St. Louis.
see you behind
that last curtain,
see you at another
time,
baby.
Paris
was just like not being there.
Celine was gone.
there was nobody there.
Paris was a bite of bluegrey air.
the women rushed by as if you would never
DARE to go to bed with
them.
there were no armies around.
everybody was rich.
there were no poor in view.
there were no old in view.
to sit at a table in a cafe
would get you careful stares from the other
patrons
who were certain that they were
more important than
you.
food was too expensive to eat.
a bottle of wine would cost you
your left hand.
Celine was gone.
the fat men smoked cigars and became
gloried puffs of smoke.
the thin men sat very straight and spoke
only to each other.
the waiters had big feet and were sure
that they were more important than
anything or
anybody.
Celine was gone.
and Picasso was dying.
Paris was absolutely nothing.
I did see a dog that looked like a
white wolf.
I don’t remember leaving
Paris.
but I must have been
there.
it was somewhat like leaving
a fashion magazine in a
train station.
the good soul
it’s not enough that he’s one of
the richest men on
television,
he has to reappear on the
tube
and complain that many other
programs are not
decent,
they are full of obscene
words and
gestures,
or that people are
“anti-social,”
that they should look up
to things that
will inspire
and purify
them.
his own program is
full of cute
children,
well-dressed, well-
fed,
overlooked by a
very understanding
father
who understands the
father better than
he does
himself.
they live in a
luxurious home
and at times
certain members of
this family
have little
programmed arguments,
but they all work it
out,
become instruments
for a more
loving and understanding
togetherness.
all that I can say
to this
is:
shit, fuck, bullshit,
crap,
come here and
bite
this.
lousy mail
drinking up here, looking out at the lights of
the city, the rows of headlights snaking down
the Harbor Freeway south
forever,
Sibelius working on the radio.
there is a small refrigerator in the room.
I get up now, reach in there, crack a
beer as
Sibelius continues to work.
about 3 times a week now I get manuscripts
in the mail from young men
who seem to think that I can get them
published.
they tell me that their work is good.
I read it and find it astonishingly
bad.
they don’t want to write, they want
fame.
they probably read their stuff to
their mothers, their girl
friends.
they probably give poetry readings
at poetry holes.
they will go on and on
typing dead work for decades
never believing that their failure is
simply the result of a lack of
talent.
as I sit tonight 3 such manuscripts
are on the desk in front of
me.
I don’t know what to tell these
men.
they have no self-doubt.
I probably won’t answer.
what would you tell them?
would you send them to hell
with a cruel comment?
would you give them
undeserved praise?
how can you be true and
kind at the same
time?
how?
THE SUICIDE
Contemplating suicide was standard practice for Marvin Denning. Sometimes his thinking about it disappeared for days, even for weeks, and he felt nearly normal, normal enough to continue living comfortably for a while. Then the urge would return. At those times life became too much for him, the hours and the days dragged along uselessly. The voices, the faces, the behavior of people sickened him.
Now, driving in from work the urge to suicide was fully there. He turned off the car radio. He had been listening to Beethoven’s 3rd and the music had seemed all wrong, pretentious, forced.
“Shit,” he said.
Marvin was driving over the bridge that took him back to his apartment. It was a bridge which spanned one of the largest harbors in the world.
Marvin stopped his car near the middle of the bridge, switched on the hazard light and got out of the machine. There was a ledge next to the bridge’s rail and he stepped up on it.
Above him stretched a wire fence a good 10 feet tall. He’d have to climb that wire fence in order to get over the side.
Below him was the water. It looked peaceful. It looked just fine.
Rush hour traffic was building up. Marvin’s car blocked the outer lane. The cars in that lane were trying to make a lane change. Traffic was backing up.
Some of the cars honked as they swung by. Drivers cursed Marvin as they drove by.
“Hey, you nuts or what?”
“Take a dive! The water’s warm!”
Marvin continued to stare down at the water. He decided to climb the fencing and go over. Then he heard another voice.
“Sir, are you all right?”
A police car had parked behind Marvin’s car. Red lights flashed. One officer approached him as the other remained in the car.
The officer moved quickly toward him. He was young with a thin white face.
“What’s the problem, sir?”
“It’s my car, officer, it has stalled, won’t start.”
“What are you doing up on the ledge?”
“Just looking.”
“Looking at what?”
“The water.”
The officer came closer.
“This is not a sightseeing area.”
“I know. It’s the car. I was just standing here, waiting.”
Marvin stepped down from the ledge. The officer was next to him. He had a flashlight.
“Open your eyes wide, please!”
He shined the flashl
ight into Marvin’s left eye, then his right, then he re-hooked the flashlight on his belt.
“Let me see your license.”
The cop took the license.
“Stay where you are.”
The cop walked back to the squad car. He stuck his head in the window and spoke with the other cop. Then he straightened up and waited. After a few minutes he walked back to Marvin, handed him back his license.
“Sir, we are going to have to move your car from the bridge.”
“You mean you’re going to call a tow truck? Thank you.”
Marvin’s car was parked on a slight incline near the center of the bridge.
“No, we are going to give you a push. Maybe when you get rolling you can get it started.”
“That’s very good of you, officer.”
“Please get in your car, sir.”
Marvin got in his car and waited. When the police car bumped his, he took off the hand brake and put it into neutral. They rolled up over the center of the bridge and down the other side. He put it into 2nd, stepped on the gas and, of course, the car started. He waved to the police and drove along.
They followed him. They followed him off the bridge and down the main boulevard. The blocks went by. They continued to follow. Then Marvin saw a cafe: The Blue Steer. He pulled into the parking lot, found a space.
The police car had pulled in behind him, a few yards to one side, between Marvin and the cafe. Marvin got out of his car, locked it and walked toward The Blue Steer. As he passed the cops in the squad car he gave them another little wave, “Thank you again, officers.”
“Better get that car checked out, sir.”
“I will, of course.”
Marvin walked into the cafe without looking back. The restaurant was packed. All the faces almost made him sick. There was a sign: