Burning in Water, Drowing in Flame (19 page)

I am

hung by a nail

the sun melts my heart

I am

cousin to the snake

and am afraid of waterfalls

I am

afraid of women and green walls

the police stop me and

tell me

while the trees whirl in the wind

(I am hungover) that my muffler is shot and

my windshield wiper doesn’t work

and the lens on my back-up light is broken.

I don’t have a back-up light,

sign the citation and am thankful,

inside,

that they don’t take me in for what I’m

thinking

sadness drips like water beads

in a half-poisoned well,

I know that my chances have narrowed down to

almost nothing—

I’m like a bug in the bathroom when you flick on the

lightswitch at 3 a.m.

love, finally, with a washrag stuffed down its

throat, pictures of joy

turned to paperclips, you

know you know you know.

once you understand this process (what you

must understand

is

that most things

just won’t work, so

you don’t try to save

them, and by the time you learn this

you’ve run out of

years)—once you understand this process

you need only get burned 2 or 3 more times

before they stuff you away, and

it’s good to know that—

stop being so fucking quick with your

rejoinders and relax—

you’re about finished, too, just

like I am. no shame

there. I can walk into any bar and

order a scotch and water,

pay,

and put my hand around the glass,

they don’t know, they won’t know,

either about you or about me,

they’ll talk about football and the

weather and the energy crisis,

and our hands will reach up

the mirror watching the hands

and we’ll drink it down—

Jane, Barbara, Frances, Linda, Liza, Stella,

father’s brown leather slipper

upsidedown in the bathroom,

nameless dead dogs,

tomorrow’s newspaper,

water boiling out of the radiator on a

Thursday afternoon, burning your arm

halfway to the elbow, and not even being

angry at the pain,

grinning for the winners

grinning for the guy who fucked your girl

while you were drunk or away

and grinning for the girl who let him.

the roses howl

in the dim wind,

we have

said the necessary things, and

getting out is next, only I’d like

to say

no matter what they’ve said,

I’ve never been mad

at anything.

old grey-haired waitresses

in cafes at night

have given it up,

and as I walk down sidewalks of

light and look into windows

of nursing homes

I can see that it is no longer

with them.

I see people sitting on park benches

and I can see by the way they

sit and look

that it is gone.

I see people driving cars

and I see by the way

they drive their cars

that they neither love nor are

loved—

nor do they consider

sex. it is all forgotten

like an old movie.

I see people in department stores and

supermarkets

walking down aisles

buying things

and I can see by the way their clothing

fits them and by the way they walk

and by their faces and their eyes

that they care for nothing

and that nothing cares

for them.

I can see a hundred people a day

who have given up

entirely.

if I go to a racetrack

or a sporting event

I can see thousands

that feel for nothing or

no one

and get no feeling

back.

everywhere I see those who

crave nothing but

food, shelter, and

clothing; they concentrate

on that,

dreamlessly.

I do not understand why these people do not

vanish

I do not understand why these people do not

expire

why the clouds

do not murder them

or why the dogs

do not murder them

or why the flowers and the children

do not murder them,

I do not understand.

I suppose they are murdered

yet I can’t adjust to the

fact of them

because they are so

many.

each day,

each night,

there are more of them

in the subways and

in the buildings and

in the parks

they feel no terror

at not loving

or at not

being loved

so many many many

of my fellow

creatures.

at exactly 12:00 midnight

1973-74

Los Angeles

it began to rain on the

palm leaves outside my window

the horns and firecrackers

went off

and it thundered.

I’d gone to bed at 9 p.m.

turned out the lights

pulled up the covers—

their gaiety, their happiness,

their screams, their paper hats,

their automobiles, their women,

their amateur drunks…

New Year’s Eve always terrifies

me

life knows nothing of years.

now the horns have stopped and

the firecrackers and the thunder…

it’s all over in five minutes…

all I hear is the rain

on the palm leaves,

and I think,

I will never understand men,

but I have lived

it through.