Intermission

Intermission, a break, but I don’t. I’m still up where Creeley left me. Some persons break into conversational formations, some into themselves, into the room, auditorium, 101, and then in line, at the door; get out. And some don’t know where, or what. What is the feeling like, I think. “Did you like it?” a stranger, but I could know her. “Yes,” I nod and say. Smile, then sigh, thinking of building directory, of door. Then thinking of where I am: I am not with hundreds of persons, all taken by Creeley, then released, but fallen. I am not moving, pushing through people, talking small, unimportantly, eating cookies, drinking apple cider. I am not erasing the experience. I move outside. I sit on a wall, my back to emptiness. I know, twenty feet, over the wall, below, there is a hardness, a surface, cement bottom. I do not look down, yet, but I am not afraid. I look up, at the sky, looking, at the moon: where I expect it. I lean over backwards, looking down, now, suspended. I see the floor is down there. I am reassured. Back into the auditorium. I sit in the same place. Persons are still talking, talking, talking. I think I want to talk to Creeley. I would say. I write poetry. I have read For Love. You poems influenced mine, noticeably. I have seen you, felt you. You have put me up ont he wall. I could not break, or fall. Small talk (anguished disgust). I don’t need to see his face make replies. I don’t need to see his face make replies. I hold a cup with a half inch of cider. I think I don’t want to drink it. I do. I hold an empty cup.

13-14 November 1970