All of Us (11 page)

Woke up this morning with

a terrific urge to lie in bed all day

and read. Fought against it for a minute.

Then looked out the window at the rain.

And gave over. Put myself entirely

in the keep of this rainy morning.

Would I live my life over again?

Make the same unforgivable mistakes?

Yes, given half a chance. Yes.

In order to be able to live

on the right side of the law.

To always use his own name

and phone number. To go bail

for a friend and not give

a damn if the friend skips town.

Hope, in fact, she does.

To give some money

to his mother. And to his

children and their mother.

Not save it. He wants

to use it up before it’s gone.

Buy clothes with it.

Pay the rent and utilities.

Buy food, and then some.

Go out for dinner when he feels like it.

And it’s okay

to order anything off the menu!

Buy drugs when he wants.

Buy a car. If it breaks

down, repair it. Or else

buy another. See that

boat? He might buy one

just like it. And sail it

around the Horn, looking

for company. He knows a girl

in Porto Alegre who’d love

to see him in

his own boat, sails full,

turn into the harbor for her.

A fellow who could afford

to come all this way

to see her. Just because

he liked the sound

of her laughter,

and the way she swings her hair.

Imagine a young man, alone, without anyone.

The moment a few raindrops streaked his glass

he began to scribble.

He lived in a tenement with mice for company.

I loved his bravery.

Someone else a few doors down

played Segovia records all day.

He never left his room, and no one could blame him.

At night he could hear the other’s

typewriter going, and feel comforted.

Literature and music.

Everyone dreaming of Spanish horsemen

and courtyards.

Processions. Ceremony, and

resplendence.

Aspen trees.

Days of rain and high water.

Leaves hammered into the ground finally.

In my heart, this plot of earth

that the storm lights.

I want to get up early one more morning,

before sunrise. Before the birds, even.

I want to throw cold water on my face

and be at my work table

when the sky lightens and smoke

begins to rise from the chimneys

of the other houses.

I want to see the waves break

on this rocky beach, not just hear them

break as I did all night in my sleep.

I want to see again the ships

that pass through the Strait from every

seafaring country in the world —

old, dirty freighters just barely moving along,

and the swift new cargo vessels

painted every color under the sun

that cut the water as they pass.

I want to keep an eye out for them.

And for the little boat that plies

the water between the ships

and the pilot station near the lighthouse.

I want to see them take a man off the ship

and put another up on board.

I want to spend the day watching this happen

and reach my own conclusions.

I hate to seem greedy—I have so much

to be thankful for already.

But I want to get up early one more morning, at least.

And go to my place with some coffee and wait.

Just wait, to see what’s going to happen.

It’s either this or bobcat hunting

with my friend Morris.

Trying to write a poem at six this

morning, or else running

behind the hounds with

a rifle in my hands.

Heart jumping in its cage.

I’m 45 years old. No occupation.

Imagine the luxuriousness of this life.

Try and imagine.

May go with him if he goes

tomorrow. But may not.

My boat is being made to order. Right now it’s about to leave

the hands of its builders. I’ve reserved a special place

for it down at the marina. It’s going to have plenty of room

on it for all my friends: Richard, Bill, Chuck, Toby, Jim, Hayden,

Gary, George, Harold, Don, Dick, Scott, Geoffrey, Jack,

Paul, Jay, Morris, and Alfredo. All my friends! They know who

they are.

Tess, of course. I wouldn’t go anyplace without her.

And Kristina, Merry, Catherine, Diane, Sally, Annick, Pat,

Judith, Susie, Lynne, Annie, Jane, Mona.

Doug and Amy! They’re family, but they’re also my friends,

and they like a good time. There’s room on my boat

for just about everyone. I’m serious about this!

There’ll be a place on board for everyone’s stories.

My own, but also the ones belonging to my friends.

Short stories, and the ones that go on and on. The true

and the made-up. The ones already finished, and the ones still

being written.

Poems, too! Lyric poems, and the longer, darker narratives.

For my painter friends, paints and canvases will be on board

my boat.

We’ll have fried chicken, lunch meats, cheeses, rolls,

French bread. Every good thing that my friends and I like.

And a big basket of fruit, in case anyone wants fruit.

In case anyone wants to say he or she ate an apple,

or some grapes, on my boat. Whatever my friends want,

name it, and it’ll be there. Soda pop of all kinds.

Beer and wine, sure. No one will be denied anything, on

my boat.

We’ll go out into the sunny harbor and have fun, that’s the idea.

Just have a good time all around. Not thinking

about this or that or getting ahead or falling behind.

Fishing poles if anyone wants to fish. The fish are out there!

We may even go a little way down the coast, on my boat.

But nothing dangerous, nothing too serious.

The idea is simply to enjoy ourselves and not get scared.

We’ll eat and drink and laugh a lot, on my boat.

I’ve always wanted to take at least one trip like this,

with my friends, on my boat. If we want to

we’ll listen to Schumann on the CBC.

But if that doesn’t work out, okay,

we’ll switch to KRAB, The Who, and the Rolling Stones.

Whatever makes my friends happy! Maybe everyone

will have their own radio, on my boat. In any case,

we’re going to have a big time. People are going to have fun,

and do what they want to do, on my boat.

Here is the poem I was going to write

earlier, but didn’t

because I heard you stirring.

I was thinking again

about that first morning in Zurich.

How we woke up before sunrise.

Disoriented for a minute. But going

out onto the balcony that looked down

over the river, and the old part of the city.

And simply standing there, speechless.

Nude. Watching the sky lighten.

So thrilled and happy. As if

we’d been put there

just at that moment.

Love of work. The blood singing

in that. The fine high rise

of it into the work. A man says,

I’m working. Or, I worked today.

Or, I’m trying to make it work.

Him working seven days a week.

And being awakened in the morning

by his young wife, his head on the typewriter.

The fullness before work.

The amazed understanding after.

Fastening his helmet.

Climbing onto his motorcycle

and thinking about home.

And work. Yes, work. The going

to what lasts.

Which of us will be left then —

old, dazed, unclear —

but willing to talk about our dead friends?

Talk and talk, like an old faucet leaking.

So that the young ones,

respectful, touchingly curious,

will find themselves stirred

by the recollections.

By the very mention of this name

or that name, and what we did together.

(As we were respectful, but curious

and excited, to hear someone tell

about the illustrious dead ahead of us.)

Of which of us will they say

to their friends,

he knew so and so! He was friends with_____

and they spent time together.

He was at that big party.

Everyone was there. They celebrated

and danced until dawn. They put their arms

around each other and danced

until the sun came up.

Now they’re all gone.

Of which of us will it be said —

he knew them? Shook hands with them

and embraced them, stayed overnight

in their warm houses. Loved them!

Friends, I do love you, it’s true.

And I hope I’m lucky enough, privileged enough,

to live on and bear witness.

Believe me, I’ll say only the most

glorious things about you and our time here!

For the survivor there has to be something

to look forward to. Growing old,

losing everything and everybody.

Behind the dirty table where Kristofferson is having

breakfast, there’s a window that looks onto a nineteenth-century

street in Sweetwater, Wyoming. A juggler

is at work out there, wearing a top hat and a frock coat,

a little reed of a fellow keeping three sticks

in the air. Think about this for a minute.

This juggler. This amazing act of the mind and hands.

A man who juggles for a living.

Everyone in his time has known a star,

or a gunfighter. Somebody, anyway, who pushes somebody

around. But a juggler! Blue smoke hangs inside

this awful café, and over that dirty table where two

grownup men talk about a woman’s future. And something,

something about the Cattlemen’s Association.

But the eye keeps going back to that juggler.

That tiny spectacle. At this minute, Ella’s plight

or the fate of the emigrants

is not nearly so important as this juggler’s exploits.

How’d
he
get into the act, anyway? What’s his story?

That’s the story I want to know. Anybody

can wear a gun and swagger around. Or fall in love

with somebody who loves somebody else. But to
juggle

for God’s sake! To give your life to that.

To go with that. Juggling.

She serves me a piece of it a few minutes

out of the oven. A little steam rises

from the slits on top. Sugar and spice —

cinnamon—burned into the crust.

But she’s wearing these dark glasses

in the kitchen at ten o’clock

in the morning—everything nice —

as she watches me break off

a piece, bring it to my mouth,

and blow on it. My daughter’s kitchen,

in winter. I fork the pie in

and tell myself to stay out of it.

She says she loves him. No way

could it be worse.

A swank dinner. Food truly wonderful

and plenty of it. It was the way I always dreamed

it would be. And it just kept coming

while we talked about the bottom line.

Even when we weren’t talking about it,

it was there—in the oysters, the lamb,

the sauces, the fine white linen, the cutlery

and goblets. It said, Here is your life, enjoy.

This is the poem I wanted to live to write! Then

to come upon the spirit in a flaming dessert —

the streaks of fire shooting up, only to drop

back, as if exhausted.

Driving home afterwards, my head aswim

from overeating. What a swine! I deserve

everything that fellow’s going to say about me.

Falling asleep in my pants on top of the covers.

But not before thinking about wolves,

a sultry day in the woods.

My life staked down in the clearing.

When I try to turn my head to reveal

the fleshy neck, I can’t move.

I don’t have the energy. Let them go

for the belly, those brother wolves

with the burning eyes.

To have come this far in a single night!

But then I never knew when to stop.

I didn’t want to use it at first.

Then I thought, no, it would

give up secrets and bring me luck —

that’s what I needed then.

Besides, he’d left it behind for me

to use when he went swimming that time.

Shortly afterwards, I met two women.

One of them loved opera and the other

was a drunk who’d done time

in jail. I took up with one

and began to drink and fight a lot.

The way this woman could sing and carry on!

We went straight to the bottom.

I took a walk on the railroad track.

Followed that for a while

and got off at the country graveyard

where a man sleeps between

two wives. Emily van der Zee,

Loving Wife and Mother,

is at John van der Zee’s right.

Mary, the second Mrs van der Zee,

also a Loving Wife, to his left.

First Emily went, then Mary.

After a few years, the old fellow himself.

Eleven children came from these unions.

And they, too, would all have to be dead now.

This is a quiet place. As good a place as any

to break my walk, sit, and provide against

my own death, which comes on.

But I don’t understand, and I don’t understand.

All I know about this fine, sweaty life,

my own or anyone else’s,

is that in a little while I’ll rise up

and leave this astonishing place

that gives shelter to dead people. This graveyard.

And go. Walking first on one rail

and then the other.