Ray

LXI

IT was noon. I could not eat.

I went over to the Hooches because I knew the old man was off for a break from the tugboats.

Mr. Hooch was there and I caught him in the very act of writing. It was about Sister, his dead daughter and my dead lover.

In the ground my daughter is but should not be

My mind and face is coming strong toward victory

In the ground but better her singing for the worms

Than the town and all of its terms

Below what happened, she lies, in no disguise

My daughter always loved the earth anyway

And when I put my ear to live grass I can hear her

I can hear her, I can hear her, I can hear her.

And when I stand up I am dirty in my veins

I am soiled throughout. That’s Sister

Mister.

He took a Kool off me. I was humiliated by his poetry and I had to go to the bathroom to cry loud. It was a storm of tears.

Sister was with me. “Keep on, Doctor,” she said.

His wife came out and gave me a nod.

When I think I’m doing good, I have to come over and see that I’m not even in the contest. In fact I have put the old fart in contact with an English prof at the school, who’s also a poet. It seems that the Collected Poems of J. Hooch are going to be a published fucking reality.

I was laboring on another one when that new nurse came in again. She was quite a choice and I was out of nooky going on four months. For some weird reason I began lying to her lavishly. They were not harmful lies. I invented a whole new biography and person. I get tired of being him, Ray, all the time.

“And so when I jumped out of the U-2 and saw all the Chinese around me, I knew there had been a misreckoning on someone’s part. Instead of killing me, however, they were friendly, knew that I was a doctor in training, and introduced me to all the ins and outs of acupuncture. I guess I began to write poems about then.”

“Wow. Do you ever write about sex?”

“Often,” I replied.

“Does anyone ever get enough sex?” she asked.

“The spring in me is very tight. Nothing else will do except gigantic fucking and sucking.

“Are you speaking poetry to me now?”