one of your stories, Joe.”
“I just told you one of my fucking stories!” He rose with a bellow and shook his fist, peering around, looking for a fight.
“Get out ya bum.”
So the man with the hat was walking through the streets again, looking up at the sky where the stars were shining and he felt like a miserable sack of shit. If a child could see him, in this state: to be picking fights when there were stars in the sky! And didn’t he always forget the stars in the sky? What right had he? And didn’t he know the meaning and beauty of the world, though he was only a lonely schmo? He was not going to be forgiven for this one, oh no!
And one block later: “I fear, concerning the manual labor of literary men. They ought to be released from every species of public or private responsibility. To them the grasshopper is a burden. I guard my moods as anxiously as a miser his money; for company, business, my own household chores, untune and disqualify me for writing. I think then the writer ought not to be married; ought not to have a family. I think the Roman Church with its celibate clergy and its monastic cells was right. If he must marry, perhaps he should be regarded happiest who has a shrew for a wife, a sharp-tongued notable dame who can and will assume the total economy of the house, and, having some sense that her philosopher is best in his study, suffers him not to intermeddle with her thrift.”
Oh, his fucking thoughts! What difference were his fucking thoughts? That was it! For uselessness and shame and for crying out loud!
The man with the hat prostrated himself on the sidewalk; but what good was it? It was three in the morning and who would be coming by to beat him up or step on his back? He crawled like a turtle into the middle of the road. Just run him over and make it quick, bud! The day would come but who the hell was he to live, talking about mail-order brides from Honduras or Barbados or the Dominican Fucking Republic. A beautiful girl never loved him, and his thoughts: Oh! His fucking thoughts were garbage. Let it end tonight!
Freeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep!
He scrambled off the road like a two-bit coward as the horn and the car blazed by him, and a man with a ruddy face leaned out the window yelling, “You miserable motherfucker get off the fucking road!”
What right had he to kill himself when there were stars in the sky, twinkling all innocent and not noticing him and noticing nothing. They were suspended so far and so beautifully, and here he was putting himself on the road to get run over when he didn’t even mean it.
THE NEXT DAY was sunny and he woke on a park bench with a bottle in his hand. He went at once to see his friend Jim.
Sitting on Jim’s couch, while Jim was in the next room stirring macaroni and cheese, just listening, the man with the hat hung his head low and told his story like a man ashamed. Jim interrupted, stomping into the room with the wooden spoon held up.
“You tell me the truth for once you godforsaken bastard.”
Oh, if it weren’t the end of the world already! November thirteenth. A month and a half till the end of the world and everyone else had end-of-the-world plans but him. He didn’t know what he would be doing.
The man with the hat started to sob and Jim went back to stir. Jim liked it real creamy. If it wasn’t real creamy it wasn’t worth shit. His friend had slept all night on a fucking park bench. Jim’s girlfriend walked into the room in a man’s shirt and looked so damn sexual the man with the hat moaned and covered his face with his hands.
“What’s the story, boys?” her voice coming out like a six-year-old girl’s, all turned-up at the end of every word. She pushed her soft hair behind her ear and leaned against the radiator with her leg showing to the hip. She smiled a big-lipped smile at the man with the hat, and in her head: “Madman, you are leaving me in the most beautiful mood of my life, in the phase of my love that
“I just told you one of my fucking stories!” He rose with a bellow and shook his fist, peering around, looking for a fight.
“Get out ya bum.”
So the man with the hat was walking through the streets again, looking up at the sky where the stars were shining and he felt like a miserable sack of shit. If a child could see him, in this state: to be picking fights when there were stars in the sky! And didn’t he always forget the stars in the sky? What right had he? And didn’t he know the meaning and beauty of the world, though he was only a lonely schmo? He was not going to be forgiven for this one, oh no!
And one block later: “I fear, concerning the manual labor of literary men. They ought to be released from every species of public or private responsibility. To them the grasshopper is a burden. I guard my moods as anxiously as a miser his money; for company, business, my own household chores, untune and disqualify me for writing. I think then the writer ought not to be married; ought not to have a family. I think the Roman Church with its celibate clergy and its monastic cells was right. If he must marry, perhaps he should be regarded happiest who has a shrew for a wife, a sharp-tongued notable dame who can and will assume the total economy of the house, and, having some sense that her philosopher is best in his study, suffers him not to intermeddle with her thrift.”
Oh, his fucking thoughts! What difference were his fucking thoughts? That was it! For uselessness and shame and for crying out loud!
The man with the hat prostrated himself on the sidewalk; but what good was it? It was three in the morning and who would be coming by to beat him up or step on his back? He crawled like a turtle into the middle of the road. Just run him over and make it quick, bud! The day would come but who the hell was he to live, talking about mail-order brides from Honduras or Barbados or the Dominican Fucking Republic. A beautiful girl never loved him, and his thoughts: Oh! His fucking thoughts were garbage. Let it end tonight!
Freeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep!
He scrambled off the road like a two-bit coward as the horn and the car blazed by him, and a man with a ruddy face leaned out the window yelling, “You miserable motherfucker get off the fucking road!”
What right had he to kill himself when there were stars in the sky, twinkling all innocent and not noticing him and noticing nothing. They were suspended so far and so beautifully, and here he was putting himself on the road to get run over when he didn’t even mean it.
THE NEXT DAY was sunny and he woke on a park bench with a bottle in his hand. He went at once to see his friend Jim.
Sitting on Jim’s couch, while Jim was in the next room stirring macaroni and cheese, just listening, the man with the hat hung his head low and told his story like a man ashamed. Jim interrupted, stomping into the room with the wooden spoon held up.
“You tell me the truth for once you godforsaken bastard.”
Oh, if it weren’t the end of the world already! November thirteenth. A month and a half till the end of the world and everyone else had end-of-the-world plans but him. He didn’t know what he would be doing.
The man with the hat started to sob and Jim went back to stir. Jim liked it real creamy. If it wasn’t real creamy it wasn’t worth shit. His friend had slept all night on a fucking park bench. Jim’s girlfriend walked into the room in a man’s shirt and looked so damn sexual the man with the hat moaned and covered his face with his hands.
“What’s the story, boys?” her voice coming out like a six-year-old girl’s, all turned-up at the end of every word. She pushed her soft hair behind her ear and leaned against the radiator with her leg showing to the hip. She smiled a big-lipped smile at the man with the hat, and in her head: “Madman, you are leaving me in the most beautiful mood of my life, in the phase of my love that
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