Page 22 (1/2)

"Should it?"

"I don't know"

"It's not real money anyway," she said "Fastdealers would own the stock exchange But that kind of s around, sat facing forward on the church pew "Anyway," she said, "I have everything I want All I ever wanted was to be left alone I wanted a decent place to live and ti about o through? They teach, or they work a straight job, or they play the poetry ga out proposals for foundation grants and getting to know the right people and kissing the right behinds I never wanted to do all that shit I just wanted to make poems"

"What did Kim want to do?"

"God knows"

"I think she was involved with soot her killed"

"Then I'm safe," she said "I'ue that I'er, do you suppose?"

I didn't knohat she meant With her eyes closed she said, " 'Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankind,' John Donne Do you kno she was involved, or hom?"

"No"

"Does her death diminish me, do you suppose? I wonder if I was involved with her I didn't know her, not really, and yet I wrote a poem about her"

"Could I see it?"

"I suppose so, but I don't see how it could tell you anything I wrote a poe real about it you'd have to go to an astronomer, not to me Poems are never about what they're about, you know They're all about the poet"

"I'd still like to see it"

This seemed to please her She went to her desk, a modern version of the old rolltop, and found what she was looking for almost immediately The poem was hand-lettered on white bond paper with an italic-nibbed pen

"I type them up for submission," she said, "but I like to see how they look on the page this way I taught raphy I learned from a book It's easier than it looks"

I read:

Bathe her in milk, let the white stream run

Pure in its bovine baptism,

Heal the least schism

Under the soonest sun Take her

Hand, tell her it doesn't matter,

Milk's not to cry over Scatter

Seed froun Break her

Bones in a lass

Sparkle upon her hand Let it be done

Let the rass