My Story.
Autobiography as Autothanatography
Born to die, bodies broken before they’re twenty(Forty hours a week for forty dollarsMuch cooler than school—cigs and beer to boot),They drove down the streets in motorized cansLooking for fights, or a girl on her own(She was asking for it, huh, you reckon?).
I grew up with them. What made me different?After a lifetime wondering I knowIt’s my desire to be by myself, alone.
I had a few friends I sometimes met up with:Two guys and a girl—she lived to argue—But mainly I was satisfied with myself.Near-sighted, round-bellied, and slow, so slow,I’d go to the library and take long walks.Boys would mock me and girls would giggle,But I got by—I liked to argue, too,And was good at it, at least now and then.
Some wanted me to be a politicianBut I’m a lousy liar and don’t hate people(People are fine as long as I can avoid them),No way I could be a professional prick.
Since I have as yet to figure out sex,I count that as a strike against me, too,The more so in that many girls welcomed meOnly to discard me in a week or two—Loners don’t make good lovers. That’s a factI wish I had learned sooner than I did.
Still, I remember every one of them,And I know I owe them more than I can pay,All of my poems tempered with their longingTo understand what their bodies could mean,Sources of power that frightened them so,In a life in disgust at life’s beginningsIn animal acts holiness condemnsEven as it exploits them every chance it gets.Who can endure such self-contradiction?Part of you dies with every groan you gruntAs each of you holds on, so we say, for dear life.
I did marry. Such a beautiful girl,Smartest girl I’d ever met, out-argueAnyone in the room, including me.We have two children and two grandchildrenWho make sex even more bewildering—How could I have any part in such wonders?Random selection is the only answer.Anything else is arrogance and ignoranceVying for the crown of stupidity.
Loners I learned make okay fathers.Children are selfish but not yet corruptAnd watching them play or singing to themIs good for a body—nourishes itIn the parts food and drink never reachWhich, moreover, you didn’t even know were there.Besides, children like watching you grow up.
A loner I do sometimes get lonely.I don’t deny that, but I’m rarely bored;I can entertain myself singing or writingMy memory coming to my rescueAs I manage to return to myself.I will admit though I do get homesick,Less so now I’m older, but I rememberWanting to lie down in a familiar placeAnd trembling to feel what “family” means. Almost all of my family are dead nowAnd to go home is to stay where I amWhich means, I think, I am my only home,A thought, I suppose, some might find unhappyExcept it’s convenient for preparing to dieSince all that will remain is just paper and stuff,The matter of my life cremated with me.
I grew up with them. What made me different?After a lifetime wondering I knowIt’s my desire to be by myself, alone.
I had a few friends I sometimes met up with:Two guys and a girl—she lived to argue—But mainly I was satisfied with myself.Near-sighted, round-bellied, and slow, so slow,I’d go to the library and take long walks.Boys would mock me and girls would giggle,But I got by—I liked to argue, too,And was good at it, at least now and then.
Some wanted me to be a politicianBut I’m a lousy liar and don’t hate people(People are fine as long as I can avoid them),No way I could be a professional prick.
Since I have as yet to figure out sex,I count that as a strike against me, too,The more so in that many girls welcomed meOnly to discard me in a week or two—Loners don’t make good lovers. That’s a factI wish I had learned sooner than I did.
Still, I remember every one of them,And I know I owe them more than I can pay,All of my poems tempered with their longingTo understand what their bodies could mean,Sources of power that frightened them so,In a life in disgust at life’s beginningsIn animal acts holiness condemnsEven as it exploits them every chance it gets.Who can endure such self-contradiction?Part of you dies with every groan you gruntAs each of you holds on, so we say, for dear life.
I did marry. Such a beautiful girl,Smartest girl I’d ever met, out-argueAnyone in the room, including me.We have two children and two grandchildrenWho make sex even more bewildering—How could I have any part in such wonders?Random selection is the only answer.Anything else is arrogance and ignoranceVying for the crown of stupidity.
Loners I learned make okay fathers.Children are selfish but not yet corruptAnd watching them play or singing to themIs good for a body—nourishes itIn the parts food and drink never reachWhich, moreover, you didn’t even know were there.Besides, children like watching you grow up.
A loner I do sometimes get lonely.I don’t deny that, but I’m rarely bored;I can entertain myself singing or writingMy memory coming to my rescueAs I manage to return to myself.I will admit though I do get homesick,Less so now I’m older, but I rememberWanting to lie down in a familiar placeAnd trembling to feel what “family” means. Almost all of my family are dead nowAnd to go home is to stay where I amWhich means, I think, I am my only home,A thought, I suppose, some might find unhappyExcept it’s convenient for preparing to dieSince all that will remain is just paper and stuff,The matter of my life cremated with me.
Dead now, too, are most of them who figure hereIn these musings on my life and theirs, but not all.Some made their way out, a few tougher than nails,Far tougher than I, some just mean (really mean),And I know they knew things I’ll never know.I try to remember and not to judgeThe things they said I didn’t understand,The things they did I wouldn’t dare to do—A coward I maybe? I really don’t know. I’ve always lived so far inside. I don’t know. Such a loner I never picked a fight,And, a big guy, I was rarely picked on.I just picked my own way night and day dreaming.
How do I know if I’m a coward or not?Maybe my life’s luck I was never tested?And I’m too old now to stand up to much,Especially after all my surgeries(My “zipper” would probably burst and … plop!). I’d be too weak and I doubt I’d care,Mine the carelessness of believing my story,Theirs the carelessness of believing nothing.
And it comes down to just that, our stories.From my earliest memory, and always,I’ve had my story, mine, to tell myself, No matter if no one else was listening.
Not yet seven years old, at Christmas one year,I sat in the bus as we were visitingNeighborhoods full of trees and lights and bells Where broadcasts of snow showcased the groundAmid houses warm in the winter dark—Children and chaperones we caroled our way:Nineteen-fifties America, you know,In a small town its good side safe and clean.But I see my face pressed against the windowAnd I feel again how forlorn I felt Since I knew already I didn't belong thereHaving come from the other side of townAt the charity of the fine peopleWho arranged it all for everyone’s good.I feel that sadness even as I write,A boy so young, in his own story, even then,Drawing to a close now seventy years on.
My story my fortune, poor as I was.I had my story to tell, hungry or not—A man can starve for meaning as well as food.
The imagination is our freedom.Everything will be taken, every last drop,But when they come for your imaginationYou may finally let go: all they have leftIs a body that proves they have no life.