i.

because I cannot recognize a colour

because I am no longer funny

do not mention a bird the desert brandy

all the stars at night

Cherifa’s kisses

plates of couscous as we knelt close by the brazier

the way we had to bend our heads to pass

ii.

I’m a writer’s writer’s writer,

and what was writing but a misery to me?

the brawling over detail, syllable by spitting syllable

it’s suicide

but here’s my story:

my nurse dropped me as a baby and then my father died,

I fell again from horseback

but my leg did not heal fine: it was TB in the knee

so I spent two years tied up, in Switzerland

coming home I met Céline, the author, then I knew I was one too,

so wrote a novel lost somewhere and found my way

to all those Village bars,

no one knew me on my knees

in doorways, my mouth around a man

to find the cash to buy my girl

some food and proper clothes

no one thinks of ugly girls in bed:

their rustling, frightful eyeballs rolling in their heads,

I loved them because nobody else would

iii

I’ll talk about him one more time:

my father sat and died one night

when I was 13 and at camp where I love those beds

like one big family, row on row

I wish I had a dormitory everywhere

and I never mentioned him again

July night and all those people sleeping happy in a line:

Get into position, I’d say

and they would laugh and laugh

Do you love me?

I love an ugly girl

iv

naughty lovely at fifteen

while I was locked in traction,

I was tutored by a Frenchman versed in Greek mythology

and venereal disease

hell, what to do but study Proust, in infinite degree?

but when I’m home I’ve got a stiff knee and a limp

no one talks about the fact I’m Jewish

the aunts and Mother all lined up to see

how well I dress

and not to be mentioned in some circles

is the fact I plain love girls

and plain girls they are, too