tubes, four focus knobs . . . Jesus Christ . . . .
But to have deliberately given her cancer, then forgotten about it, only to run its course in her helpless body . . . . Had no one thought to get her to a doctor?
The first thing was food. Yes, food. I grabbed a taxi and motored to North Beach, thinking all the way over there about how Hemingway, when he had no money, would describe in his nascent novels and stories fantastic meals in wonderful detail, to slake a hunger that ultimately would be satisfied beyond his wildest nightmares. I, possessed of so insignificant a talent, could afford to eat a huge Hu Nan meal at Brandy Hoâs. Sweet and sour dumplings in a delicious ginger sauce sprinkled with chopped peppers and garlic, stuffed with a paté of pork and vegetables. Hot and sour beef, with sliced carrots, garlic, and onions, served over steamed rice. Cold noodle salad, with huge bean sprouts, plenty of slivered chicken, slices of raw, fresh cucumber, covered by a peanut sauce of extreme zest. Three Kirin beers. I skipped the smoked ham fried rice, with ropes of scrambled egg and fresh garden peas, likewise the carp, broiled whole and served on a bed of vegetables and rice, and segued directly to ginger ice cream with green tea, and ate the whole meal with my shades on. Absolutely No MSG. Meals with MSG are for when you have a deadline and the nightmares arenât forthcoming. But when you can eat like this, why write about it? Taking a post-prandial stroll up Grant Avenue, I saw many poets. Bob Kaufman, Gregory Corso and Kay McDonough with baby Nile, Neeli Cherkovski, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Janice Blue all dressed in blue, David Moe, Jack Hirschman and Sara Menefee. While Kaye wasnât listening Corso told me I had no balls. Neeli told me he wasnât getting published. I discreetly refrained from telling him about BOOK.SUB. Without saying a word, Bob Kaufman said
My radio is teaching my goldfish jujitsu . . . .
Jack Hirschman read me one of the poems heâd written that day.
PEACEDOVE
Of the dove, of the
dove-lands and what they mean,
how it is
to be
a dove, a struggle-dove
the dove thatâs been born
over and over since
the end of the World War,
and where the dove comes from
and how it stands for
the utter
invincibility of peace
and is always triumphant
as the sincerely innate
inspiration of human beings.
At the time Jack hated electricity, so I knew heâd eschew anything as electrifying as BOOK.SUB. And all I could think about there on the street, with my full stomach, and hungry gentle poetic friends, was that I hadnât killed anybody yet today. But I had seen someone Iâd maimed. This did not throw off my digestion. Instead, I got drunk and fell into a pit of nerves, woke up as somebody, somewhere, else. A pseudonym. So now, was the question, could the Moral Imperative yet seek me out? Of course. This is just a detective novel. Iâm going to get mine, right in the kisser, from the sword of the Avenger, whoever she is. Would it be the lady with the ruined throat and tongue? Or would Tiny get to Windrow before he expired from AIDS? Does he really have AIDS, or is Thimbelina just smarter than Windrow? How about that woman who never got skinned in The Gourmet ? Would somebody be selling pieces of me with Velcro fasteners on Fishermanâs Wharf? How would it come? When? Should I get BOOK.SUBâs by now not inconsiderable legal DO loop to make out my literary estate to Marlene?
Marlene. Right then, right there, in front of a dive called The Saloon on Grant Street, I resolved that never, ever, would I use the beautiful Marlene in a book. Stay just as you are, baby. Let your life take its natural course. Fuck your tenants as they come and go, collect their rent, forget them when they leave, keep a clean house. Iâll never lift you, whole or in part, out of your quiet if somewhat adventurous little life next to Alta Plaza Park, and use you in a detective novel, so help me god.
But to have deliberately given her cancer, then forgotten about it, only to run its course in her helpless body . . . . Had no one thought to get her to a doctor?
The first thing was food. Yes, food. I grabbed a taxi and motored to North Beach, thinking all the way over there about how Hemingway, when he had no money, would describe in his nascent novels and stories fantastic meals in wonderful detail, to slake a hunger that ultimately would be satisfied beyond his wildest nightmares. I, possessed of so insignificant a talent, could afford to eat a huge Hu Nan meal at Brandy Hoâs. Sweet and sour dumplings in a delicious ginger sauce sprinkled with chopped peppers and garlic, stuffed with a paté of pork and vegetables. Hot and sour beef, with sliced carrots, garlic, and onions, served over steamed rice. Cold noodle salad, with huge bean sprouts, plenty of slivered chicken, slices of raw, fresh cucumber, covered by a peanut sauce of extreme zest. Three Kirin beers. I skipped the smoked ham fried rice, with ropes of scrambled egg and fresh garden peas, likewise the carp, broiled whole and served on a bed of vegetables and rice, and segued directly to ginger ice cream with green tea, and ate the whole meal with my shades on. Absolutely No MSG. Meals with MSG are for when you have a deadline and the nightmares arenât forthcoming. But when you can eat like this, why write about it? Taking a post-prandial stroll up Grant Avenue, I saw many poets. Bob Kaufman, Gregory Corso and Kay McDonough with baby Nile, Neeli Cherkovski, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Janice Blue all dressed in blue, David Moe, Jack Hirschman and Sara Menefee. While Kaye wasnât listening Corso told me I had no balls. Neeli told me he wasnât getting published. I discreetly refrained from telling him about BOOK.SUB. Without saying a word, Bob Kaufman said
My radio is teaching my goldfish jujitsu . . . .
Jack Hirschman read me one of the poems heâd written that day.
PEACEDOVE
Of the dove, of the
dove-lands and what they mean,
how it is
to be
a dove, a struggle-dove
the dove thatâs been born
over and over since
the end of the World War,
and where the dove comes from
and how it stands for
the utter
invincibility of peace
and is always triumphant
as the sincerely innate
inspiration of human beings.
At the time Jack hated electricity, so I knew heâd eschew anything as electrifying as BOOK.SUB. And all I could think about there on the street, with my full stomach, and hungry gentle poetic friends, was that I hadnât killed anybody yet today. But I had seen someone Iâd maimed. This did not throw off my digestion. Instead, I got drunk and fell into a pit of nerves, woke up as somebody, somewhere, else. A pseudonym. So now, was the question, could the Moral Imperative yet seek me out? Of course. This is just a detective novel. Iâm going to get mine, right in the kisser, from the sword of the Avenger, whoever she is. Would it be the lady with the ruined throat and tongue? Or would Tiny get to Windrow before he expired from AIDS? Does he really have AIDS, or is Thimbelina just smarter than Windrow? How about that woman who never got skinned in The Gourmet ? Would somebody be selling pieces of me with Velcro fasteners on Fishermanâs Wharf? How would it come? When? Should I get BOOK.SUBâs by now not inconsiderable legal DO loop to make out my literary estate to Marlene?
Marlene. Right then, right there, in front of a dive called The Saloon on Grant Street, I resolved that never, ever, would I use the beautiful Marlene in a book. Stay just as you are, baby. Let your life take its natural course. Fuck your tenants as they come and go, collect their rent, forget them when they leave, keep a clean house. Iâll never lift you, whole or in part, out of your quiet if somewhat adventurous little life next to Alta Plaza Park, and use you in a detective novel, so help me god.
Similar Books
