11.

Steps

How funny you are today New York
like Ginger Rogers in Swingtime
and St. Bridget’s steeple leaning a little to the left

here I have just jumped out of a bed full of V-days
(I got tired of D-days) and blue you there still
accepts me foolish and free
all I want is a room up there
and you in it
and even the traffic halt so thick is a way
for people to rub up against each other
and when their surgical appliances lock
they stay together
for the rest of the day (what a day)
I go by to check a slide and I say
that painting’s not so blue

where’s Lana Turner
she’s out eating
and Garbo’s backstage at the Met
everyone’s taking their coat off
so they can show a rib-cage to the rib-watchers
and the park’s full of dancers with their tights and shoes
in little bags
who are often mistaken for worker-outers at the West Side Y
why not
the Pittsburgh Pirates shout because they won
and in a sense we’re all winning
we’re alive

the apartment was vacated by a gay couple
who moved to the country for fun
they moved a day too soon
even the stabbings are helping the population explosion
though in the wrong country
and all those liars have left the UN
the Seagram Building’s no longer rivalled in interest
not that we need liquor (we just like it)

and the little box is out on the sidewalk
next to the delicatessen
so the old man can sit on it and drink beer
and get knocked off it by his wife later in the day
while the sun is still shining

oh god it’s wonderful
to get out of bed
and drink too much coffee
and smoke too many cigarettes
and love you so much


- Frank O'Hara

sometimes silence is a habit that hurts

In my quest to find the three E.L. Konigsburg books I wanted to reread the most I found Franny and Zooey, all my other Konigsburgs, two copies of The Count of Monte Cristo, all my Toni Morrisons I thought I'd lost in the move, my grandmother's Austen compilation, and a very pretty hardbound of the complete Adam Smith. Why do we have a very pretty hardbound of the complete Adam Smith. Don't answer that question.

Bookshelf-deciphering problems aside: I haven't always loved E.L. Konigsburg's work, but I've always loved her voice, how she looked at art and the world and silence and speech, her smart-mouthed sharp-minded grounded preteen protagonists, her unwillingness to be lofty and her equal unwillingness to dumb herself down. Rest in peace, madam. The world was a better place for having you in it.

I picked up my pen and filled it properly, the six-step process that Tillie had taught me. She had said, "You must think of these six steps not as preparation for the beginning but as the beginning itself." I knew then that I had started my B&B. I let my pen drink up a whole plunger of ink and then holding the pen over the bottle, I squeezed three drops back into the bottle.

And I thought- a B&B letter is giving just a few drops back to the bottle. I put away the tiny notepad and took out a full sheet of calligraphy paper and began,

Dear Grandma Sadie and Grandpa Nate,
Thank you for a vacation that was out of this world...