AT (for Christina)
H H
ENTRANCE damp night in Cambridge
O A
V leaves rain heavy
E
N blurred lights in mist
the Troll leading the way--to a large house on a corner--near the
Observatory--beside tennis courts--fences ghostly in fog--smell of
October--leaf mold--brilliance of oil slicks in puddles gleaming--picked
out by passing lights--
the Troll could be--
a well meaning friend . . .
--you'll like this guy--he reads books--does some
drugs--works for the Party at his job at the Globe
Party guys ain't supposed--
--yeah but he's a writer, too, see--gotta
experience everything
he writes for the Globe--
--Nah--works in the baling room--Union gig--lotta dough
what's he write--
--stories about the working man Jack
and drugs on the side--
--yeah he's a good shit--needs somebody to talk to
talk's cheap enough--
inside a long stair way mezzanine to mezzanine--a few girls
sitting in a darkened glassed in porch--looking sideways--
--at the top of the stairs, doors and corridors--
books on
shelves
heaped--smell of a recent shower--dim sounds in rooms--
KNOCKING on the door . . . a muffled voice--
the Troll stood patiently--looking at his new boots--scuffing a
spot of leaf--a scrap of paper--a hint of mud . . .
. . . door opening
a
crack
sleepy eyes looking out--handsome face--dark hair
in dim light had a sheen to it
--yo I boughtcha a friend--he's cool--reads a lot
man--has a lotta books anyway--the guy i told you about
long pause . . . eyes focusing . . . head turning cautious to
check the room . . .
Finally . . . the head moved behind the door--door swung open slowly--
a nice room--desk with lamp, big armchairs, shelves of books, big
bay window looking out to rainy night--trees, tennis court, distant
street lights--giant bed--boxes of records--
the handsome man moved catlike--flicked with his foot a syringe
under covers hanging from the bed--looked as though he'd been long
dozing--
rain picked up--the Troll lit a cigarette--floppied in a
chair--stared out the window--
moving through the dim lit room--looking at the walls, the books--
a giant photo of Mayakovsky staring from a corner--
"Four words,
heavy as a blow:
' . . . unto Caesar . . . unto God . . . '
But where can a man
like me
bury his head?
Where is there shelter for me?"
the Troll sat impassive in shadows--smoking--the handsome man sat
slowly down on the bed--his eyes gleamed--coming awake--catlike movement
coiled in attention--
"I yelled at the sun point-blank:
'Get down!
Stop crawling into that hellhole!'
At the sun I yelled:
'You shiftless lump!
You're caressed by the clouds,
while here--winter and summer--
I must sit and draw these posters!'"
the Troll despite himself stared--cigerette close to burning
clenched fingers--the handsome man's eyes smoldered--a convulsion slowly
rippled his body--he fumbled for a glass--
(and very cliche
shall have its day
its effects tried and true . . .
the mind wandering . . . has at hand
its few crutches
in a pinch)
girls voices in the hall--windows rain blurred light
streaked--the handsome man--
the Troll had said--
needed someone to talk to--
& so had dug up for him from a basement room near the Mt. Auburn
Cemetery a ghost--
to ventriloquise--for the benefit--of whom?
the Party man--the writer in search of experiences--
a dizzying labyrinth
an abcess in the labyrinth
erupted in space
(--turning eyes to avert the collision--so as not to untidy the
room . . .
an incessant voice shadowing remnants of a life . . .
no desire to leave its corpse on clean rugs--
in a warm room--cozy among covers--
desk lamps and padded chairs--)
the Troll on the way over--had recounted--a confused story--a
labored parable--of "Protective Custody" . . .
"In your
cozy
little apartment world,
curly-heded lyricists sprout in bedrooms.
What do you find in these lapdog lyricists?!
As for me,
I learned about love
In Butryiki . . .
"I
fell in love
with the keyhole of Cell 103
Staring at the daily sun,
people ask:
'How much do they cost, those little sunbeams?'
But I
for a yellow patch
of light jumping on the wall
would thenhave given everything in the world."
the Troll jumped--the cigerette had singed his
fingers--he cursed softly--the handsome man rose slowly
--from the bed--his arms arcing as he moved forwards--
--Comrade! you know Mayakovsky!--
he knows a lot of weird shit--
the Troll was pleased with himself . . . he prided
himself on his surprises--he had a reputation to keep up--and
there might be something in it for him . . .
the handsome man put out his hands--to shake--and
embrace--he seemed at once solid--and hollow--a large
construction in balsa wood--
the Troll sat perched expectantly--the handsome
man--noticing--turned to a cabinet--pulled out bottles of
imported beer--an opener--moving to the desk--sliding open a
slim concealed drawer--produced two ampules--
Coversations-- may be worked like toy racing
cars--their speeds controlled--on a plastic track--with each
voice competing--
into the curve the handsome man went--excitedly--steadying on
the straightaway--
the Troll enjoyed such sports--was a one man crowd--
Mayakovsky's photo--large--glowered on the wall--stop
watches in his eyes
the handsome man explained his mission, his work, his
readings--his writings--his collections of pornography and
O!! music--his car moving fast, lap after lap--curve,
straightaway, curve, straightaway--
the Troll supplied with beers urging on the drivers--
the photo Mayakovsky's stop watch eyes whirring . . . rain
on windows--girls' voices--warm room--ampules broken--a red
dot on arm--
But the Third Writers' Congress wa troubling--historical
facts muddy myths--and vice versa--
the handsome man revealed--he was a Trotskyite
he had struggles reconciling his duties and his desires--
which he thought could be justified--by wrting--by being
an observer and worker at the front lines--of Party and
prose--
--so--and you Comrade--how do you know Mayakovsky?--
how do you reconcile duties and desires--do you
write--are you political--
my duties and desires
are the same--
--but where did you learn all this--do you write--
do you study--do you believe in commitment--
the Troll stirred restlessly--uncertain of the speeding
cars--a yellow caution flag in his hands--gesturing for
another beer--
--I was committed--to Protective Custody--
he laughed nervously--
the handsome man waited patiently--serving drinks--cleaning
ashtrays--putting away syringes and spoons--
--pretty good stuff-
-he said--his eyes pinned, a slight smile--I only get the
best anymore--stolen from a hospital--
the hospital heist was legendary--the handsome man knew
someone who knew someone who knew . . .
--but back to Mayakovsky!--he's pretty good stuff too--
Mayakovsky on the wall--fine bottled beer--the best of
morphine--a slight odor of perfume--nice hardbound books--
comfortable chairs--a big bed--rain rolling on window pane--
outside the Observatory and tennis courts--
Gorky means the bitter one--
--but Gorky's ralism is not developed enough--
it is not easy to develop
bitterness--
--it can be channeled for use--my area of
interest--
the race cars went round and round--no one would be at the
Observatory on a night like this--the Cemetery leaves
must be heavy to bruash against tonight--the tennis
courts slippery--
the Third Congress--festered--a scab the handsome man dug at--
morphine and and warmth stirred his rhetoric--he spoke
with lazy passion--a fascination with distant deaths moved
him--
in his panoramic view of history--of literature--mythological
battles were translated into the facts of everyday struggles--
his job--his writing--myth and history speeding on a plastic
track--competing--for a drunken crowd--
the Observatory this night--had no panoramic view--the domed
roof closed against the rain--only a seismograph inside
registering planetary movements--dim jottings of fault
lines--
through an abcess in time--space rushed in--and in it time
whirred in photographed eyes--a record of light once there--
reprojected in a dim lit room--
through an abcess in skin--a liquid rained in--mixing in
veins to a pumping heart--the lungs contracted--projecting
dreamed images--
wet windows--blurred lights--a mirror on a half opened
closet door presenting their reflections--
room full of images--
--later
the Troll was standing by the door--giving his customary
word of parting--a leap in time seemed to have occurred--
outsdie the wind had picked up--the leaves gesturing
frantically--making a transeint script of shadows on walls--
writing went on all around--signs everywhere--their
significances muted in wind--among leaves--
an old empty house stood on a corner where two streets
joined in a haphazard diagonal--the railings of a metal
fence punctuated by rust and dents--its gate held by a
padlocked chain--signs plastered on boarded windows--
--they say it's haunted--
the Troll walked faster when passing it--he had a
few bottles in his pockets--that wouldn't be missed for a
day or tow--all in an evening's work--for the middleman--
the Troll dropped off and headed North--
--later
--his eyes
asked for a thanks--his hands received opther bottles
not to be missed for a day or two--
the Cemetery with its hill looked like the hump of the
Observatory--surmounted by its tower--a telescope
stretched to clouds--a telescope stretched to clouds--
"If you wish.
I shall rage on raw meat:
or, as the sky changes its hue,
if you wish,
I shall grow irrepraachably tender:
not a man, but a cloud in trousers!"
leaves heavy with rain rustling restlessly--the night patrol
car's lights scribbling tree branches' shadowed calligraphies
on headstones--among the famous and statued dead--
and far away the State statues of suicided Mayakovsky stood--
"I feel
my 'I'
is much too small for me.
Stubbornly a body pushes out of me."