WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.780 align:middle line:90% 00:00:00.780 --> 00:00:03.840 align:middle line:84% I'd like to read some excerpts from the book I've been working 00:00:03.840 --> 00:00:13.510 align:middle line:84% on for quite a long time, which is an effort that developed 00:00:13.510 --> 00:00:18.070 align:middle line:84% in the course of trying to treat this material to reintroduce 00:00:18.070 --> 00:00:20.440 align:middle line:90% fictional method to poetry. 00:00:20.440 --> 00:00:22.840 align:middle line:84% It's been used in a scattered way, 00:00:22.840 --> 00:00:25.330 align:middle line:84% but by and large the poets have left 00:00:25.330 --> 00:00:30.680 align:middle line:84% scenes and fictional technique to the prose writers. 00:00:30.680 --> 00:00:33.610 align:middle line:84% And I think they've left out too good a thing. 00:00:33.610 --> 00:00:36.670 align:middle line:84% Chaucer had something going that 20th century lyric 00:00:36.670 --> 00:00:39.500 align:middle line:90% poetry has dropped off. 00:00:39.500 --> 00:00:42.250 align:middle line:84% Browning had his own way of getting it back, 00:00:42.250 --> 00:00:46.330 align:middle line:84% but by and large though poems have told limited stories, 00:00:46.330 --> 00:00:49.940 align:middle line:84% they haven't tried to do what the short story is doing. 00:00:49.940 --> 00:00:51.850 align:middle line:84% This is a book to be published in May 00:00:51.850 --> 00:00:54.940 align:middle line:90% and it's called Lives of X. 00:00:54.940 --> 00:00:58.750 align:middle line:84% And I suppose I didn't want to call them autobiographies 00:00:58.750 --> 00:01:01.390 align:middle line:84% because they're lives of people I used to be once 00:01:01.390 --> 00:01:03.820 align:middle line:90% but have stopped being. 00:01:03.820 --> 00:01:06.490 align:middle line:90% So it stops being auto. 00:01:06.490 --> 00:01:09.190 align:middle line:84% X is some unknown quantity and it 00:01:09.190 --> 00:01:14.170 align:middle line:84% has had a number of lives on gone through various stages. 00:01:14.170 --> 00:01:18.250 align:middle line:84% And as I say, I didn't set out to develop a method, 00:01:18.250 --> 00:01:20.050 align:middle line:84% but in order to treat this material 00:01:20.050 --> 00:01:25.120 align:middle line:84% I had to use devices that had fallen away from poetry. 00:01:25.120 --> 00:01:30.310 align:middle line:84% And I suppose some people will decide that I've gone dull 00:01:30.310 --> 00:01:35.590 align:middle line:84% or maybe I've always been dull because if one 00:01:35.590 --> 00:01:37.990 align:middle line:84% is going for lyrical intensity, he can 00:01:37.990 --> 00:01:41.020 align:middle line:90% write a certain kind of line. 00:01:41.020 --> 00:01:43.750 align:middle line:84% But if he is writing a scene, the scene 00:01:43.750 --> 00:01:44.860 align:middle line:90% has to have the structure. 00:01:44.860 --> 00:01:46.720 align:middle line:84% And the lines have to know how to relax 00:01:46.720 --> 00:01:48.760 align:middle line:90% as well as how to get tight. 00:01:48.760 --> 00:01:50.950 align:middle line:84% And that's the balance one walks. 00:01:50.950 --> 00:01:53.080 align:middle line:84% If you lose the balance you fall off, 00:01:53.080 --> 00:01:55.270 align:middle line:84% and I'm not ready to say I haven't fallen off. 00:01:55.270 --> 00:01:58.070 align:middle line:84% This is the best I could do with them. 00:01:58.070 --> 00:02:01.390 align:middle line:84% This poem is called "The Benefits of an Education," 00:02:01.390 --> 00:02:06.310 align:middle line:84% and the scene is Boston 1931 as indicated in the subtitle. 00:02:06.310 --> 00:02:10.900 align:middle line:84% And there are perhaps two things I should explain. 00:02:10.900 --> 00:02:12.310 align:middle line:90% I lived in Medford. 00:02:12.310 --> 00:02:14.110 align:middle line:84% Having been born in Boston, we moved 00:02:14.110 --> 00:02:17.950 align:middle line:84% to Medford which is a suburban town about seven miles out. 00:02:17.950 --> 00:02:21.070 align:middle line:84% And on my way into Boston during the Depression-- and nickel 00:02:21.070 --> 00:02:22.030 align:middle line:90% was a lot of money. 00:02:22.030 --> 00:02:25.870 align:middle line:84% Everybody was squeezing a nickel one way or another, sometimes 00:02:25.870 --> 00:02:27.670 align:middle line:90% indecently. 00:02:27.670 --> 00:02:34.290 align:middle line:84% But Charlestown was Irish town and it 00:02:34.290 --> 00:02:37.230 align:middle line:84% was built on Bunker Hill, which is really 00:02:37.230 --> 00:02:39.150 align:middle line:84% Breed's Hill is where the battle was. 00:02:39.150 --> 00:02:41.760 align:middle line:84% Bunker Hill is the larger configuration. 00:02:41.760 --> 00:02:44.640 align:middle line:84% And there's a long several mile slope 00:02:44.640 --> 00:02:47.370 align:middle line:84% down this hill and a straight line 00:02:47.370 --> 00:02:50.970 align:middle line:84% to where the elevated terminal is like a forest of girders 00:02:50.970 --> 00:02:54.360 align:middle line:84% rising out of a circle called Sullivan Square. 00:02:54.360 --> 00:02:57.270 align:middle line:84% And one of the manhood rituals of the young toughs 00:02:57.270 --> 00:03:01.950 align:middle line:84% would be to steal a car and ride the loop, which 00:03:01.950 --> 00:03:04.200 align:middle line:84% means you get going about 80 miles an hour 00:03:04.200 --> 00:03:07.500 align:middle line:84% or faster and just plow down the middle of this street 00:03:07.500 --> 00:03:09.327 align:middle line:84% and hope the cops would chase you. 00:03:09.327 --> 00:03:11.160 align:middle line:84% And then when you got the Sullivan's Square, 00:03:11.160 --> 00:03:14.160 align:middle line:84% you hope you miss the girders which 00:03:14.160 --> 00:03:15.660 align:middle line:84% wasn't easy to do because you had 00:03:15.660 --> 00:03:18.840 align:middle line:84% to dodge in and out of them, and then you would clear off 00:03:18.840 --> 00:03:21.630 align:middle line:84% toward Everett and jump the car and go back 00:03:21.630 --> 00:03:25.560 align:middle line:84% and you are a big shot in the gang of savages. 00:03:25.560 --> 00:03:29.460 align:middle line:84% And riding in the loop was one of the madnesses of the times. 00:03:29.460 --> 00:03:34.620 align:middle line:84% I suppose it was like marathon dancing and this sort of thing. 00:03:34.620 --> 00:03:36.930 align:middle line:84% I think it's an impressive recollection because 00:03:36.930 --> 00:03:38.730 align:middle line:84% of the poverty of imagination that 00:03:38.730 --> 00:03:42.480 align:middle line:84% would make this a rich thing to do, I suppose. 00:03:42.480 --> 00:03:45.390 align:middle line:84% Kids in the Midwest have been playing some fairly high level 00:03:45.390 --> 00:03:47.820 align:middle line:84% games of chicken on the highways, which 00:03:47.820 --> 00:03:50.260 align:middle line:84% is another kind of poverty of the imagination. 00:03:50.260 --> 00:03:52.210 align:middle line:84% I mean get yourself killed interestingly, 00:03:52.210 --> 00:03:55.440 align:middle line:84% at least, not proving to some oaf 00:03:55.440 --> 00:03:57.930 align:middle line:84% that you're a bigger oaf than he is. 00:03:57.930 --> 00:04:01.050 align:middle line:84% And also at the same time a phenomenon 00:04:01.050 --> 00:04:06.280 align:middle line:84% that has disappeared very largely I recall around Boston 00:04:06.280 --> 00:04:12.450 align:middle line:84% I grew up a whole ring of rather ugly frame houses. 00:04:12.450 --> 00:04:14.340 align:middle line:84% And during the Depression people could not 00:04:14.340 --> 00:04:18.149 align:middle line:84% keep up the mortgage payments and the bank repossessed them. 00:04:18.149 --> 00:04:19.529 align:middle line:84% And when the house was foreclosed 00:04:19.529 --> 00:04:21.450 align:middle line:84% they would put a red flag on it meaning 00:04:21.450 --> 00:04:22.950 align:middle line:84% this house was for sale if you could 00:04:22.950 --> 00:04:25.320 align:middle line:84% pay the taxes in the back mortgage payments, 00:04:25.320 --> 00:04:27.060 align:middle line:90% and nobody could. 00:04:27.060 --> 00:04:30.270 align:middle line:84% And I recall walking down streets. 00:04:30.270 --> 00:04:31.772 align:middle line:90% They seldom evicted anybody. 00:04:31.772 --> 00:04:33.480 align:middle line:84% It's better to have somebody in the house 00:04:33.480 --> 00:04:35.730 align:middle line:84% even if he wasn't paying rent, than to have it empty 00:04:35.730 --> 00:04:38.040 align:middle line:90% and have the pipes freeze. 00:04:38.040 --> 00:04:40.560 align:middle line:84% But it was a rather dreary symbol 00:04:40.560 --> 00:04:43.920 align:middle line:84% of the time to find house after house with a red flag on it. 00:04:43.920 --> 00:04:45.930 align:middle line:84% You see somebody had made his investment 00:04:45.930 --> 00:04:48.450 align:middle line:84% and started to pay off the mortgage and lost his job 00:04:48.450 --> 00:04:50.580 align:middle line:90% and lost his house. 00:04:50.580 --> 00:04:54.660 align:middle line:84% And it was part of that miserable milieu 00:04:54.660 --> 00:04:56.370 align:middle line:90% and here's the poem. 00:04:56.370 --> 00:04:59.520 align:middle line:84% One summer I had a job on an excursion fishing boat 00:04:59.520 --> 00:05:02.760 align:middle line:84% and fell in love with Boston Harbor. 00:05:02.760 --> 00:05:05.760 align:middle line:84% And one of the islands of the harbor, these 00:05:05.760 --> 00:05:07.920 align:middle line:90% were great glacial drumlins. 00:05:07.920 --> 00:05:10.470 align:middle line:84% But when the glacier melted it sometimes 00:05:10.470 --> 00:05:12.700 align:middle line:90% had a pocket full of dirt in it. 00:05:12.700 --> 00:05:15.240 align:middle line:84% And if there was enough dirt, it would make a hill, 00:05:15.240 --> 00:05:17.940 align:middle line:84% and some of these stuck up out of the water 00:05:17.940 --> 00:05:19.110 align:middle line:90% and would be islands. 00:05:19.110 --> 00:05:21.570 align:middle line:84% And then very rapidly the tides eroded them 00:05:21.570 --> 00:05:23.070 align:middle line:90% and they disappeared. 00:05:23.070 --> 00:05:26.220 align:middle line:84% And one of the famous ones is the Nixie's Mate 00:05:26.220 --> 00:05:30.000 align:middle line:84% because the mate of the pirate Nixie back in colonial days 00:05:30.000 --> 00:05:33.270 align:middle line:90% was hanged for piracy. 00:05:33.270 --> 00:05:36.180 align:middle line:84% And he insisted that he was innocent. 00:05:36.180 --> 00:05:38.820 align:middle line:84% He was hanged on the island that was later 00:05:38.820 --> 00:05:40.740 align:middle line:84% named the Nixie's Mate and he insisted 00:05:40.740 --> 00:05:42.420 align:middle line:90% that it was he was innocent. 00:05:42.420 --> 00:05:45.180 align:middle line:84% And the time would prove it because the island on which he 00:05:45.180 --> 00:05:47.520 align:middle line:90% was hanged would disappear. 00:05:47.520 --> 00:05:48.870 align:middle line:90% And it is all but disappeared. 00:05:48.870 --> 00:05:50.940 align:middle line:90% It's just a mud shallows now. 00:05:50.940 --> 00:05:52.980 align:middle line:84% And I guess he had watched the harbor 00:05:52.980 --> 00:05:55.710 align:middle line:84% and knew that these islands were going and wanted 00:05:55.710 --> 00:05:57.870 align:middle line:84% to make a metaphysical joke toward the end 00:05:57.870 --> 00:05:59.430 align:middle line:90% because I suspect he was guilty. 00:05:59.430 --> 00:06:04.740 align:middle line:84% But it's nice to have observant criminals. 00:06:04.740 --> 00:06:07.260 align:middle line:90% 00:06:07.260 --> 00:06:10.920 align:middle line:84% "A hulk, three masted once, three stubbed 00:06:10.920 --> 00:06:14.790 align:middle line:84% now carried, away by any history and dumped 00:06:14.790 --> 00:06:19.170 align:middle line:84% in a mud ballast of low tide, heeled over and a third 00:06:19.170 --> 00:06:22.710 align:middle line:84% swallowed in the black sucked south of the Nixie's Mate, 00:06:22.710 --> 00:06:26.820 align:middle line:84% itself going, gave me a seal of memory 00:06:26.820 --> 00:06:32.790 align:middle line:84% for a wax I wouldn't find for years yet this was Boston. 00:06:32.790 --> 00:06:35.970 align:middle line:84% Men with nothing to do plovered the sand edge 00:06:35.970 --> 00:06:38.940 align:middle line:84% with clam rakes that raked nothing. 00:06:38.940 --> 00:06:41.310 align:middle line:84% I walked home over the drawbridge 00:06:41.310 --> 00:06:43.710 align:middle line:84% skirting on my right Charlestown, 00:06:43.710 --> 00:06:46.800 align:middle line:84% ramshackle holdover Bunker Hill and waiting 00:06:46.800 --> 00:06:50.670 align:middle line:84% for hopped up kids to ride the loop and die in a tin 00:06:50.670 --> 00:06:54.660 align:middle line:84% rumble against the girders of Sullivan Square 00:06:54.660 --> 00:06:58.410 align:middle line:84% or dodge away toward Everett and ditch the car then 00:06:58.410 --> 00:07:02.370 align:middle line:84% walk home and be heroes to ingrown boyos, 00:07:02.370 --> 00:07:05.460 align:middle line:84% poor as the streets they prowled. 00:07:05.460 --> 00:07:09.210 align:middle line:84% There, house to house, the auctioneer's red flag 00:07:09.210 --> 00:07:12.720 align:middle line:84% drooped its torn foreclosure to no buyer. 00:07:12.720 --> 00:07:16.200 align:middle line:84% Now and then a blind man who could see 00:07:16.200 --> 00:07:18.600 align:middle line:84% and his squat wife who could stare out 00:07:18.600 --> 00:07:22.170 align:middle line:84% at nothing sat on the curb by the stacked furniture 00:07:22.170 --> 00:07:25.410 align:middle line:84% and put the babies to sleep in dresser drawers 00:07:25.410 --> 00:07:30.320 align:middle line:84% till charity came or rain made a pulp of all. 00:07:30.320 --> 00:07:32.300 align:middle line:90% The rest lived in. 00:07:32.300 --> 00:07:35.840 align:middle line:84% Got in their limp red flags, the bank 00:07:35.840 --> 00:07:39.050 align:middle line:84% was the new owner and that was all. 00:07:39.050 --> 00:07:42.680 align:middle line:84% Why evict nothing much to make room for nothing? 00:07:42.680 --> 00:07:46.010 align:middle line:84% Some sort of man is better than no man 00:07:46.010 --> 00:07:49.730 align:middle line:84% and might scrounge crates to keep the pipes from freezing 00:07:49.730 --> 00:07:52.640 align:middle line:84% until the water co turned off the meter. 00:07:52.640 --> 00:07:55.850 align:middle line:84% Or come election when men got their dole, 00:07:55.850 --> 00:08:00.710 align:middle line:84% the bank might get the trickle of a rent that wasn't there. 00:08:00.710 --> 00:08:03.860 align:middle line:84% I'd walk those seven miles from Medford to T Wharf 00:08:03.860 --> 00:08:06.560 align:middle line:84% to get my job on the King Philip. 00:08:06.560 --> 00:08:11.270 align:middle line:84% While not quite a job but work free passage and a chance 00:08:11.270 --> 00:08:14.960 align:middle line:84% to scrounge nickels and fish all summer till school 00:08:14.960 --> 00:08:19.550 align:middle line:84% opened Miss Bates and Washington Irving. 00:08:19.550 --> 00:08:23.180 align:middle line:84% The King Philip rose sheer, three riverboat decks top 00:08:23.180 --> 00:08:26.150 align:middle line:84% heavy, but she could ride an inner harbor swell 00:08:26.150 --> 00:08:30.350 align:middle line:84% and not quite capsize, though God knows she would try. 00:08:30.350 --> 00:08:31.970 align:middle line:90% Excursion fishing. 00:08:31.970 --> 00:08:34.730 align:middle line:84% She put out at nine from the creaking stink 00:08:34.730 --> 00:08:37.159 align:middle line:84% of Sicilian fishing boats praying 00:08:37.159 --> 00:08:43.220 align:middle line:84% for gasoline they sometimes got and came back in at five. 00:08:43.220 --> 00:08:45.680 align:middle line:84% In any weather that might turn up a dollar 00:08:45.680 --> 00:08:48.920 align:middle line:84% a head half deck load doling four quarters 00:08:48.920 --> 00:08:52.880 align:middle line:84% into the first mate's hand as if the fish they meant to eat 00:08:52.880 --> 00:08:59.270 align:middle line:84% were in it and not still on a bottom out past luck, sometimes 00:08:59.270 --> 00:09:00.770 align:middle line:90% hundreds or more. 00:09:00.770 --> 00:09:05.480 align:middle line:84% But of them all not 20 would turn up with a dollar bill. 00:09:05.480 --> 00:09:07.470 align:middle line:90% It was all change. 00:09:07.470 --> 00:09:10.940 align:middle line:84% We call the first mate jingles waiting for him 00:09:10.940 --> 00:09:15.140 align:middle line:84% to walk across the Wharf and spill his pockets into the tin 00:09:15.140 --> 00:09:17.630 align:middle line:90% box in the fish market safe. 00:09:17.630 --> 00:09:23.300 align:middle line:84% When he came back his name was Dixon and we could cast off. 00:09:23.300 --> 00:09:26.720 align:middle line:84% Your dollar back, you eight hours on the water, free lines, 00:09:26.720 --> 00:09:29.960 align:middle line:84% free bait, your catch and noon to one, 00:09:29.960 --> 00:09:32.630 align:middle line:84% all the fish chowder you could eat. 00:09:32.630 --> 00:09:37.460 align:middle line:84% Good days, the decks were slimed with pollock, cod, hake, 00:09:37.460 --> 00:09:42.560 align:middle line:84% haddock, a flounder or two, and now and then a skate. 00:09:42.560 --> 00:09:45.230 align:middle line:84% A sharp man with a saw-toothed small tin 00:09:45.230 --> 00:09:50.120 align:middle line:84% can punch out Foolish Scallops from a skate's wing. 00:09:50.120 --> 00:09:53.240 align:middle line:84% A Foolish Scallop is a scallop for fools who 00:09:53.240 --> 00:09:55.580 align:middle line:90% eat it and don't know better. 00:09:55.580 --> 00:10:00.170 align:middle line:84% I made a scraper by screwing bottle caps to an oak paddle 00:10:00.170 --> 00:10:03.320 align:middle line:84% and went my rounds, cleaning the catch for pennies, 00:10:03.320 --> 00:10:07.550 align:middle line:84% or grabbing a gaff to help haul in the big ones. 00:10:07.550 --> 00:10:11.240 align:middle line:84% Dixon, jingling again, took up a pool, 00:10:11.240 --> 00:10:14.750 align:middle line:84% a dollar for the biggest cod or haddock, a half 00:10:14.750 --> 00:10:17.420 align:middle line:84% for the largest fish of any kind. 00:10:17.420 --> 00:10:21.290 align:middle line:84% No house cut but the little he could steal and not be caught 00:10:21.290 --> 00:10:25.250 align:middle line:84% or, being caught, pass off as an honest man's 00:10:25.250 --> 00:10:27.560 align:middle line:90% mistake in a ripped pocket. 00:10:27.560 --> 00:10:30.170 align:middle line:90% The deal was winner-take-all. 00:10:30.170 --> 00:10:33.170 align:middle line:84% And the man that gaffed the winning fish aboard 00:10:33.170 --> 00:10:35.960 align:middle line:90% was down for a tip. 00:10:35.960 --> 00:10:38.510 align:middle line:84% One Sunday, with over a hundred in the pool, 00:10:38.510 --> 00:10:41.330 align:middle line:84% I gaffed to skate we couldn't get aboard. 00:10:41.330 --> 00:10:44.360 align:middle line:84% Dixon boathooked it dead still in the water, 00:10:44.360 --> 00:10:47.660 align:middle line:84% then rigged a sling and tackle from rotten gear 00:10:47.660 --> 00:10:50.090 align:middle line:84% and I went over the side and punched two holes 00:10:50.090 --> 00:10:51.720 align:middle line:90% behind its head. 00:10:51.720 --> 00:10:54.140 align:middle line:84% Then we paid out the hooks the firemen used 00:10:54.140 --> 00:10:57.350 align:middle line:84% for hauling cans of ashes to dump them overboard, 00:10:57.350 --> 00:11:00.440 align:middle line:84% and I hooked it on, and all hands hauled it 00:11:00.440 --> 00:11:04.190 align:middle line:84% clear to hang like a mat from the main to the lower deck. 00:11:04.190 --> 00:11:07.550 align:middle line:84% We couldn't weigh it, but it was no contest. 00:11:07.550 --> 00:11:09.620 align:middle line:90% Dixon paid on the spot. 00:11:09.620 --> 00:11:14.660 align:middle line:84% He counted it out to fifty-seven dollars, and I got two. 00:11:14.660 --> 00:11:16.340 align:middle line:84% We took it into the wharf and let 00:11:16.340 --> 00:11:20.000 align:middle line:84% it hang, a flag, till the next day when 00:11:20.000 --> 00:11:24.170 align:middle line:84% we cut it loose with half of ceremony, mostly of flies, 00:11:24.170 --> 00:11:26.630 align:middle line:90% just as we cleared Deer Island. 00:11:26.630 --> 00:11:29.120 align:middle line:84% The Captain didn't want that shadow floating 00:11:29.120 --> 00:11:31.340 align:middle line:84% over his treasury of likely bottoms, 00:11:31.340 --> 00:11:34.000 align:middle line:90% so we let the current have it. 00:11:34.000 --> 00:11:36.870 align:middle line:84% After five, the firemen rigged the hose, 00:11:36.870 --> 00:11:39.810 align:middle line:84% turned on the pressure, and I washed down, 00:11:39.810 --> 00:11:42.120 align:middle line:84% flying the fish and fish guts out 00:11:42.120 --> 00:11:46.320 align:middle line:84% of the scuppers in a rainbow spray to a congregation 00:11:46.320 --> 00:11:50.580 align:middle line:84% of God-maddened gulls screaming their witness over the stinking 00:11:50.580 --> 00:11:53.370 align:middle line:90% slip, for leavings. 00:11:53.370 --> 00:11:55.710 align:middle line:90% Fishermen are now keepers. 00:11:55.710 --> 00:11:59.880 align:middle line:84% One to eat, a few to give away, and that's enough. 00:11:59.880 --> 00:12:02.760 align:middle line:84% The scuppers might spill over, and the deck 00:12:02.760 --> 00:12:04.980 align:middle line:84% on both sides of a walkway might be 00:12:04.980 --> 00:12:10.110 align:middle line:84% littered with blue-backed and white-bellied gapers staring. 00:12:10.110 --> 00:12:13.110 align:middle line:90% I cleaned the best to haul home. 00:12:13.110 --> 00:12:15.750 align:middle line:84% Or I did when I had carfare, or thought 00:12:15.750 --> 00:12:19.200 align:middle line:84% I could climb the fence into the El and ride free. 00:12:19.200 --> 00:12:22.770 align:middle line:84% Now and then, Gillis, who ran a market next to ruin, 00:12:22.770 --> 00:12:25.860 align:middle line:84% would buy a cod or haddock for nothing a pound 00:12:25.860 --> 00:12:28.380 align:middle line:90% and throw in a pack of Camels. 00:12:28.380 --> 00:12:32.310 align:middle line:84% And half the time an old clutch of black shawl 00:12:32.310 --> 00:12:35.580 align:middle line:84% with a face inside it and a nickel in its fist 00:12:35.580 --> 00:12:37.680 align:middle line:84% would flutter aboard like something 00:12:37.680 --> 00:12:40.710 align:middle line:84% blown from a clothes-line near a freight yard, 00:12:40.710 --> 00:12:43.740 align:middle line:84% and squeeze a spit accordion in her lungs 00:12:43.740 --> 00:12:48.630 align:middle line:84% to wheeze for a bit of "any old fish left over," flashing 00:12:48.630 --> 00:12:52.290 align:middle line:84% her nickel like a badge, and singing widowed beatitudes 00:12:52.290 --> 00:12:55.560 align:middle line:84% when I picked a good one and wrapped it in newspaper 00:12:55.560 --> 00:12:58.680 align:middle line:84% and passed it over and refused her ritual nickel 00:12:58.680 --> 00:13:00.060 align:middle line:90% the third time. 00:13:00.060 --> 00:13:02.070 align:middle line:90% "I can afford to pay, son." 00:13:02.070 --> 00:13:03.540 align:middle line:90% "Sure you can." 00:13:03.540 --> 00:13:05.340 align:middle line:90% "Here, now, it's honest money." 00:13:05.340 --> 00:13:06.480 align:middle line:90% "Sure it is." 00:13:06.480 --> 00:13:08.220 align:middle line:90% "Well, take it then." 00:13:08.220 --> 00:13:10.050 align:middle line:90% "Compliments of the house." 00:13:10.050 --> 00:13:12.330 align:middle line:84% "God bless you and your proud mother," 00:13:12.330 --> 00:13:16.260 align:middle line:84% she'd end, and take the wind back to her line. 00:13:16.260 --> 00:13:18.840 align:middle line:84% Then the Fish Market man got after Dixon 00:13:18.840 --> 00:13:21.600 align:middle line:84% for letting me steal his customers. 00:13:21.600 --> 00:13:23.040 align:middle line:90% Nickels are nickels. 00:13:23.040 --> 00:13:25.500 align:middle line:84% For all he knew, I might be stealing from him 00:13:25.500 --> 00:13:27.630 align:middle line:90% out of that pocket of nothing. 00:13:27.630 --> 00:13:29.430 align:middle line:90% But I foxed him. 00:13:29.430 --> 00:13:33.000 align:middle line:84% Next time the old shawl came I sent her off to wait 00:13:33.000 --> 00:13:34.650 align:middle line:90% by Atlantic Avenue. 00:13:34.650 --> 00:13:37.080 align:middle line:84% And I'm damned if the Fish Market 00:13:37.080 --> 00:13:40.980 align:middle line:84% man didn't call to her waving a flipper of old bloat, calling 00:13:40.980 --> 00:13:41.520 align:middle line:90% "Cheap! 00:13:41.520 --> 00:13:43.185 align:middle line:84% Just right for a pot of chowder!" 00:13:43.185 --> 00:13:45.780 align:middle line:90% 00:13:45.780 --> 00:13:49.470 align:middle line:84% After that, I made an extra bundle every night, 00:13:49.470 --> 00:13:52.560 align:middle line:84% cleaned and filleted, and once she wasn't there 00:13:52.560 --> 00:13:55.350 align:middle line:84% I fed the cats, or anything else of God's that 00:13:55.350 --> 00:13:57.280 align:middle line:90% didn't run a market. 00:13:57.280 --> 00:14:00.660 align:middle line:84% Then five nights running she didn't come. 00:14:00.660 --> 00:14:04.470 align:middle line:84% Which in God's proper market might be more mercy 00:14:04.470 --> 00:14:09.150 align:middle line:84% than all nickels are, whoever keeps the register, whoever 00:14:09.150 --> 00:14:12.900 align:middle line:90% folds old shawls for burial. 00:14:12.900 --> 00:14:16.140 align:middle line:84% Some nights, once, twice a week or some weeks 00:14:16.140 --> 00:14:20.940 align:middle line:84% not, the ship was charted for a stag by the VFW-- 00:14:20.940 --> 00:14:25.470 align:middle line:84% We used to call them the Victims of Foreign Whores. 00:14:25.470 --> 00:14:28.830 align:middle line:84% --or some lodge, or some club, though the promoter 00:14:28.830 --> 00:14:32.430 align:middle line:84% was always the same stink in tired tout's tweed. 00:14:32.430 --> 00:14:35.460 align:middle line:84% He rigged a rigged wheel forward on the lower deck, 00:14:35.460 --> 00:14:38.100 align:middle line:84% sold bootleg by the men's room, used 00:14:38.100 --> 00:14:42.090 align:middle line:84% the Ladies' as an undressing room for the girlie show that 00:14:42.090 --> 00:14:45.900 align:middle line:84% squeezed its naked pinched companionway to the main deck 00:14:45.900 --> 00:14:50.310 align:middle line:84% "salon" to do the split or sun itself in leers, 00:14:50.310 --> 00:14:54.030 align:middle line:84% clutching a stanchion, or, when the hat was passed, 00:14:54.030 --> 00:14:57.870 align:middle line:84% to mount the table and play house, if not home, 00:14:57.870 --> 00:15:02.220 align:middle line:84% two at a time, with a gorilla stinking of pomade who came 00:15:02.220 --> 00:15:05.340 align:middle line:84% on in a bathrobe from the Ladies'. 00:15:05.340 --> 00:15:08.550 align:middle line:84% Two shows a night, prompt as mind's death 00:15:08.550 --> 00:15:11.430 align:middle line:84% could make them while it still had a body. 00:15:11.430 --> 00:15:14.550 align:middle line:84% And on the top deck, for an extra quarter, 00:15:14.550 --> 00:15:19.390 align:middle line:84% Tillie the Artist's Model undid her flickering all on a canvas 00:15:19.390 --> 00:15:22.020 align:middle line:84% screen lashed to the back of the wheelhouse, 00:15:22.020 --> 00:15:24.480 align:middle line:84% where the Captain kept a sharp Yankee 00:15:24.480 --> 00:15:27.600 align:middle line:90% watch for the Harbor Cruiser. 00:15:27.600 --> 00:15:29.860 align:middle line:84% He was a good gray stick of salt, 00:15:29.860 --> 00:15:32.340 align:middle line:84% hull down in some lost boyhood that 00:15:32.340 --> 00:15:36.660 align:middle line:84% had put to sea with the last whales still running in myth. 00:15:36.660 --> 00:15:40.260 align:middle line:84% And down to this, or be beached flat, 00:15:40.260 --> 00:15:44.250 align:middle line:84% keeled over like Boston, or that hulk off the Nixie's Mate, 00:15:44.250 --> 00:15:47.010 align:middle line:90% to stink in the mud for nothing. 00:15:47.010 --> 00:15:51.600 align:middle line:84% Nevertheless, it was some education and some school. 00:15:51.600 --> 00:15:55.410 align:middle line:84% I panted at those desks of flesh flung open, 00:15:55.410 --> 00:15:58.920 align:middle line:84% did mountains of dream homework with willing Tillie, 00:15:58.920 --> 00:16:02.340 align:middle line:84% and, mornings, ran a cloth and a feather duster-- 00:16:02.340 --> 00:16:03.990 align:middle line:90% God knows where it came from. 00:16:03.990 --> 00:16:07.630 align:middle line:84% I'd guess Mrs. Madden who cooked the daily chowder of leftovers 00:16:07.630 --> 00:16:09.420 align:middle line:90% in her throbbing galley. 00:16:09.420 --> 00:16:14.010 align:middle line:84% --over the counters, chairs, and the great ark-built table, 00:16:14.010 --> 00:16:16.650 align:middle line:90% still flesh-haunted. 00:16:16.650 --> 00:16:20.160 align:middle line:84% If it wasn't an education, it was lessons in something 00:16:20.160 --> 00:16:23.740 align:middle line:84% I had to know before I could learn what I was learning. 00:16:23.740 --> 00:16:26.700 align:middle line:84% Whatever there was to learn in the stinking slips 00:16:26.700 --> 00:16:30.120 align:middle line:84% and cat-and-rat wet alleys off the black girders 00:16:30.120 --> 00:16:34.980 align:middle line:84% and the slatted shadow of the Atlantic Avenue El in Boston 00:16:34.980 --> 00:16:37.620 align:middle line:84% where the edge-grinding wheels of nothing 00:16:37.620 --> 00:16:42.330 align:middle line:84% screeched something from Hell at every sooty bend. 00:16:42.330 --> 00:16:45.540 align:middle line:84% I took home more than I brought with me of all Miss Blake 00:16:45.540 --> 00:16:48.840 align:middle line:84% and Washington Irving knew of Sleepy Hollow." 00:16:48.840 --> 00:16:51.450 align:middle line:90% I'm going to skip a part here. 00:16:51.450 --> 00:16:54.870 align:middle line:84% "Still, I got one thing from my education. 00:16:54.870 --> 00:16:57.780 align:middle line:84% One stag-night when the tired tout's bootleg 00:16:57.780 --> 00:17:02.100 align:middle line:84% sold too well for what it was, four poisoned drunks lay 00:17:02.100 --> 00:17:06.000 align:middle line:84% writhing in the stern on the lower deck in their own spew. 00:17:06.000 --> 00:17:10.230 align:middle line:84% And one, half dead but groaning, green in his sweat, 00:17:10.230 --> 00:17:14.130 align:middle line:84% lay choking and dry-heaving his pump broken. 00:17:14.130 --> 00:17:17.430 align:middle line:84% While from the deck above girls clattered, 00:17:17.430 --> 00:17:21.630 align:middle line:84% the pimp spieled, and the crowd raved. 00:17:21.630 --> 00:17:24.089 align:middle line:84% Dixon came after me with the tout. 00:17:24.089 --> 00:17:26.849 align:middle line:90% "Hey, kid, got a good stomach?" 00:17:26.849 --> 00:17:27.510 align:middle line:90% Dixon said. 00:17:27.510 --> 00:17:29.550 align:middle line:84% "Got a good stomach?", Dixon said. 00:17:29.550 --> 00:17:32.460 align:middle line:84% "Yeah, sure," I told him, honored. 00:17:32.460 --> 00:17:34.020 align:middle line:90% "It's a dirty job." 00:17:34.020 --> 00:17:35.340 align:middle line:90% "What isn't?" 00:17:35.340 --> 00:17:36.780 align:middle line:90% "Five bucks!" said the tout. 00:17:36.780 --> 00:17:37.680 align:middle line:90% "Five bucks! 00:17:37.680 --> 00:17:38.460 align:middle line:90% Here, Johnny. 00:17:38.460 --> 00:17:41.190 align:middle line:84% Five bucks cash and you can hold it! 00:17:41.190 --> 00:17:44.070 align:middle line:90% My God, the guy could die!" 00:17:44.070 --> 00:17:47.400 align:middle line:84% and pass the five to Dixon who spread it open with both hands 00:17:47.400 --> 00:17:50.400 align:middle line:84% to let me see it before he put it away. 00:17:50.400 --> 00:17:52.320 align:middle line:84% "And a deuce from me if you'll do it," 00:17:52.320 --> 00:17:57.210 align:middle line:84% he tacked on, taking my greedy silence for resistance. 00:17:57.210 --> 00:17:58.230 align:middle line:90% "Who do I kill?" 00:17:58.230 --> 00:18:01.950 align:middle line:84% I said, taking the line from George Raft, probably. 00:18:01.950 --> 00:18:03.270 align:middle line:90% "Look, kid, it's legal. 00:18:03.270 --> 00:18:06.240 align:middle line:84% You save a guy!" the tout said in a spout. 00:18:06.240 --> 00:18:08.910 align:middle line:84% "Lay off," said Dixon, and putting his hand 00:18:08.910 --> 00:18:11.610 align:middle line:84% on my shoulder, he walked me off two paces. 00:18:11.610 --> 00:18:12.840 align:middle line:90% "It's like this. 00:18:12.840 --> 00:18:16.020 align:middle line:84% The guy's choked full of rotgut and can't heave it. 00:18:16.020 --> 00:18:19.410 align:middle line:84% I tried to stick my fingers down his throat to get him started, 00:18:19.410 --> 00:18:21.120 align:middle line:90% but I just can't make it. 00:18:21.120 --> 00:18:23.970 align:middle line:84% Kid," he said, "it take guts I ain't got. 00:18:23.970 --> 00:18:26.880 align:middle line:90% You got the guts to try?" 00:18:26.880 --> 00:18:29.190 align:middle line:84% And there I was with the chance to have 00:18:29.190 --> 00:18:34.110 align:middle line:84% more guts than a first mate, and seven dollars to boot! 00:18:34.110 --> 00:18:34.900 align:middle line:90% "Which guy?" 00:18:34.900 --> 00:18:37.380 align:middle line:84% I said, only for something to say. 00:18:37.380 --> 00:18:39.120 align:middle line:90% I knew already. 00:18:39.120 --> 00:18:40.830 align:middle line:90% "That groaner up by the winch. 00:18:40.830 --> 00:18:43.050 align:middle line:84% I got a fid to jam between his teeth--" 00:18:43.050 --> 00:18:44.690 align:middle line:90% You know what a fid is? 00:18:44.690 --> 00:18:49.790 align:middle line:84% It's a piece of hard wood, long and comes to a point, 00:18:49.790 --> 00:18:52.730 align:middle line:90% for being passed through-- 00:18:52.730 --> 00:18:54.350 align:middle line:90% for splicing rope. 00:18:54.350 --> 00:18:55.940 align:middle line:84% And he'd put the thick end of the fid 00:18:55.940 --> 00:18:58.500 align:middle line:84% in the man's teeth to keep him from biting down, taking off 00:18:58.500 --> 00:18:59.000 align:middle line:90% a finger. 00:18:59.000 --> 00:19:03.540 align:middle line:90% 00:19:03.540 --> 00:19:05.850 align:middle line:84% "I got a fid to jam between his teeth 00:19:05.850 --> 00:19:09.180 align:middle line:84% if you'll reach in and stick your fingers down his throat." 00:19:09.180 --> 00:19:11.460 align:middle line:84% We raised him, half sitting, with his head 00:19:11.460 --> 00:19:15.140 align:middle line:84% back on the chains, and Dixon got the thick end of the fid 00:19:15.140 --> 00:19:17.610 align:middle line:84% jammed into his teeth on one side. 00:19:17.610 --> 00:19:20.430 align:middle line:84% "Let's go kid!" he screamed, almost as green 00:19:20.430 --> 00:19:22.320 align:middle line:84% as the half-corpse that had begun 00:19:22.320 --> 00:19:26.040 align:middle line:84% to tremble like a fish thrown on the deck, not dead yet, 00:19:26.040 --> 00:19:28.770 align:middle line:90% though too dead the buck again. 00:19:28.770 --> 00:19:31.560 align:middle line:84% But when I touch the slime that might have been his tongue, 00:19:31.560 --> 00:19:33.220 align:middle line:90% I couldn't make it. 00:19:33.220 --> 00:19:36.180 align:middle line:90% "Dixon, I can't do it!" 00:19:36.180 --> 00:19:38.460 align:middle line:84% "Well, damn your eyes, you said you would. 00:19:38.460 --> 00:19:41.730 align:middle line:84% Now put up, or by God I'll have you over!" 00:19:41.730 --> 00:19:44.130 align:middle line:84% "Wait a minute," I said, catching my education 00:19:44.130 --> 00:19:44.940 align:middle line:90% by the tail. 00:19:44.940 --> 00:19:46.560 align:middle line:84% "Can you hold them there a minute?" 00:19:46.560 --> 00:19:47.670 align:middle line:90% "If he lives. 00:19:47.670 --> 00:19:49.440 align:middle line:90% Now where the Hell you going?" 00:19:49.440 --> 00:19:51.750 align:middle line:84% "I'll be right back," I called, already going. 00:19:51.750 --> 00:19:54.090 align:middle line:90% "I'll be right back." 00:19:54.090 --> 00:19:57.540 align:middle line:84% I ran to the locker, grabbed the feather duster, 00:19:57.540 --> 00:20:00.540 align:middle line:84% and ran back, snatching out the grimiest feather, 00:20:00.540 --> 00:20:03.570 align:middle line:84% took out my knife, peeled off all but 00:20:03.570 --> 00:20:05.580 align:middle line:84% the tip, then fished his throat with it, 00:20:05.580 --> 00:20:08.430 align:middle line:84% twirling the stem till I felt in not up. 00:20:08.430 --> 00:20:09.240 align:middle line:90% "Evoe!" 00:20:09.240 --> 00:20:12.900 align:middle line:84% I shouted for Bacchus to remember I remembered, 00:20:12.900 --> 00:20:16.350 align:middle line:84% not knowing till later that I mispronounced it "EE-VO," 00:20:16.350 --> 00:20:19.290 align:middle line:84% not giving Bacchus all his syllables. 00:20:19.290 --> 00:20:23.100 align:middle line:84% "Heave-ho it is!" roared Dixon and ducked aside as the corpse 00:20:23.100 --> 00:20:24.120 align:middle line:90% spouted. 00:20:24.120 --> 00:20:27.810 align:middle line:90% "There, by God, she blows!" 00:20:27.810 --> 00:20:30.030 align:middle line:90% And blow she did. 00:20:30.030 --> 00:20:34.110 align:middle line:84% I've never seen a man that dirty and still alive. 00:20:34.110 --> 00:20:36.810 align:middle line:84% Except maybe the tout clapping me on the shoulder. 00:20:36.810 --> 00:20:37.830 align:middle line:90% "You did it, kid. 00:20:37.830 --> 00:20:39.030 align:middle line:90% By God, you did it! 00:20:39.030 --> 00:20:42.330 align:middle line:90% Johnny, didn't he do it!" 00:20:42.330 --> 00:20:45.390 align:middle line:84% Dixon wiped his hands on the drunk's back where he had 00:20:45.390 --> 00:20:48.420 align:middle line:84% twisted and sprawled over the winch-drum-- 00:20:48.420 --> 00:20:50.940 align:middle line:84% What reflex is it turns a dead man over 00:20:50.940 --> 00:20:53.250 align:middle line:90% to let him retch face-down? 00:20:53.250 --> 00:20:56.130 align:middle line:84% --and fished the five out of his pocket. 00:20:56.130 --> 00:20:58.260 align:middle line:90% "Where'd you learn that trick?" 00:20:58.260 --> 00:21:01.590 align:middle line:84% he said as I took the money and waited for more. 00:21:01.590 --> 00:21:05.010 align:middle line:84% I could have told him, "Dmitri Merezhkovsky, Julian 00:21:05.010 --> 00:21:08.340 align:middle line:84% the Apostate," but it wasn't on Miss Blake's list, 00:21:08.340 --> 00:21:10.830 align:middle line:90% and certainly not on his. 00:21:10.830 --> 00:21:12.090 align:middle line:90% "How about the other deuce?" 00:21:12.090 --> 00:21:14.040 align:middle line:90% I said instead. 00:21:14.040 --> 00:21:16.260 align:middle line:84% He was holding the feather duster by the handle 00:21:16.260 --> 00:21:19.620 align:middle line:84% and turning it in his wrist to inspect it from all sides 00:21:19.620 --> 00:21:22.140 align:middle line:84% and looking down into its head of fuzz. 00:21:22.140 --> 00:21:25.500 align:middle line:84% "What's this thing doing on a ship?" he said. 00:21:25.500 --> 00:21:28.560 align:middle line:84% "Waiting for Romans," I told him, guessing his game 00:21:28.560 --> 00:21:30.180 align:middle line:90% but hoping to play him off. 00:21:30.180 --> 00:21:31.920 align:middle line:90% "That's history, Dixon. 00:21:31.920 --> 00:21:35.010 align:middle line:84% When a man went to a banquet and stuffed himself, 00:21:35.010 --> 00:21:38.160 align:middle line:84% he'd head for a men's room called a vomitorium, 00:21:38.160 --> 00:21:40.770 align:middle line:84% tickle his throat with a feather, do an upchuck, 00:21:40.770 --> 00:21:41.880 align:middle line:90% and then start over. 00:21:41.880 --> 00:21:44.670 align:middle line:90% How about that deuce?" 00:21:44.670 --> 00:21:47.880 align:middle line:84% "If you're so smart, then you can figure out I 00:21:47.880 --> 00:21:51.080 align:middle line:90% said if you used your fingers." 00:21:51.080 --> 00:21:53.430 align:middle line:84% "Hey," said the tout, "If you ain't paying up, 00:21:53.430 --> 00:21:54.720 align:middle line:90% get back my fin! 00:21:54.720 --> 00:21:58.140 align:middle line:84% If you can welch on this punk kid, then I can!" 00:21:58.140 --> 00:22:01.080 align:middle line:84% "Go peddle your sewer sweat," Dixon said. 00:22:01.080 --> 00:22:01.830 align:middle line:90% "Here, kid. 00:22:01.830 --> 00:22:03.300 align:middle line:90% You earned it right enough. 00:22:03.300 --> 00:22:06.000 align:middle line:90% Go buy yourself more education." 00:22:06.000 --> 00:22:08.565 align:middle line:84% And stuffed into my pocket a crumple 00:22:08.565 --> 00:22:12.150 align:middle line:90% I unfolded into one bill-- 00:22:12.150 --> 00:22:15.300 align:middle line:84% See, you always have to save what you can in those days. 00:22:15.300 --> 00:22:18.870 align:middle line:84% --while he went forward, shoving the tout away. 00:22:18.870 --> 00:22:21.630 align:middle line:90% Six dollars then, one short. 00:22:21.630 --> 00:22:24.060 align:middle line:84% But the first cash my education ever 00:22:24.060 --> 00:22:27.240 align:middle line:84% paid, and that from off the reading 00:22:27.240 --> 00:22:31.350 align:middle line:84% list, though of the Empire, if not the Kingdom. 00:22:31.350 --> 00:22:35.400 align:middle line:84% Meanwhile, the hat passed, the crowd's roar signaling, 00:22:35.400 --> 00:22:38.640 align:middle line:84% the pomade gorilla came from the Ladies' and pushed up 00:22:38.640 --> 00:22:43.170 align:middle line:84% the stairs from his own vomitorium to the orgy where 00:22:43.170 --> 00:22:47.310 align:middle line:84% low sisters of meretricis honestae waited to mount 00:22:47.310 --> 00:22:50.790 align:middle line:84% their table through lit smoke into my nose-to-the-window 00:22:50.790 --> 00:22:55.440 align:middle line:84% education one deck below the Captain's Yankee eye on watch 00:22:55.440 --> 00:22:57.840 align:middle line:84% for the Harbor Cruiser and the tide, 00:22:57.840 --> 00:23:00.730 align:middle line:84% bearing off Thompson Island to the left, 00:23:00.730 --> 00:23:05.130 align:middle line:84% Deer Island to the right, and dead ahead Boston's night-glow 00:23:05.130 --> 00:23:09.930 align:middle line:84% spindled like two mists, one on the flood-lit needle of Bunker 00:23:09.930 --> 00:23:14.730 align:middle line:84% Hill, one on the Custom House, both shimmering out to sit 00:23:14.730 --> 00:23:19.470 align:middle line:84% the waters of Babylon off Boston, whose dented cup, 00:23:19.470 --> 00:23:23.370 align:middle line:84% an original Paul Revere fallen from the hand to hand, 00:23:23.370 --> 00:23:28.920 align:middle line:84% I drained like the kings of fornication, mad for dirty wine 00:23:28.920 --> 00:23:32.870 align:middle line:84% and for the kingdoms opening like a book." 00:23:32.870 --> 00:23:34.000 align:middle line:90%