" Nothing, you said.
" What is under the pillow? I asked.
"I reached under the pillow with my hand. You grasped my wrist. An alarm clock spread the alarm. I rose to go. My survey of the incidence of weeping in the bedrooms of members of the faculty of the University of Bridgeport was methodologically sound but informed, you said, by too little compassion. You laughed, in your room, pulling from under the pillow grainy gray photographs in albums, pictures of people weeping. I wanted to effect a rapprochement, I wanted to reconcile irreconcilable forces. What is the reward for knowing the worst? The reward for knowing the worst is an honorary degree from the University of Bridgeport, salt tears in a little bottle. I wanted to engage in a meaningful dialogue, but the seminal thinkers I contacted were all shaken with sobs, wracked is the word for it. Why did we conceal that emotion which, had we declared it, could have liberated us? There are no parameters for measuring the importance of this question. My life-enhancing poem was mildly meretricious, as you predicted. I wanted to substantiate an unsubstantiated report, I listened to the Blue Network, I heard weeping. I wanted to make suitable arrangements but those whose lives I had thought to arrange did not appear on the appointed day. They were deployed elsewhere marching and counter-marching on fields leased from the Police Athletic League. I was perhaps not lucky enough. I wanted to make a far-reaching reevaluation. I had in mind launching a three-pronged assault, but the prongs wandered off seduced by fires and clowns. It was hell there, in the furnace of my ambition. It was because, you said, I had read the wrong book. He reversed himself in his last years, you said, in the books no one would publish. But his students remember, you said."
"IS there someplace I can put this?" Paul asked indicating the large parcel he held in his arms. "It is a new thing I just finished today, still a little wet Im afraid." He wiped his hands which were covered with emulsions on his trousers. "Ill just lean it up against your wall for a moment." Paul leaned the new thing up against our wall for a moment. The new thing, a dirty great banality in white, poor-white and off-white, leaned up against the wall. "Interesting," we said. "Its poor," Snow White said. "Poor, poor." "Yes," Paul said, "one of my poorer things I think." "Not so poor of course as yesterdays, poorer on the other hand than some," she said. "Yes," Paul said, "it has some of the qualities of poorness." "Especially poor in the lower left-hand corner," she said. "Yes," Paul said, "I would go so far as to hurl it into the marketplace." "Theyre getting poorer," she said. "Poorer and poorer," Paul said with satisfaction, "descending to unexplored depths of poorness where no human intelligence has ever been." "I findit extremely interesting as a social phenomenon," Snow White said, "to note that during the height of what is variously called, abstract expressionism, action painting and so forth, when most artists were grouped together in a school, you have persisted in an image alone. That, I find -- and I think it has been described as hard-edge painting, is an apt description, although it leaves out a lot, but I find it very interesting that in the last few years there is a tremendous new surge of work being done in the hard-edge image. I dont know if you want to comment on that, but I find it extremely interesting that you, who have always been sure of yourself and your image, were one of the earliest, almost founders of that school, if you can even call it a school." "I have always been sure of myself and my image," Paul said. "Sublimely poor," she murmured. "Wall-paper," he said. They kissed. We trudged to bed then singing the to-bed song heigh-ho. She was lying there in her black vinyl pajamas. "He is certainly a well-integrated personality, Paul," she said. "Yes," we said. "He makes contact, you must grant him that."; "Yes," we said. "A beautiful human being." "Carrying the mace is a bit much, perhaps," we said. "We are fortunate to have him in our country," she concluded.
"YES," Bill said, "I wanted to be great, once. But the moon for that was not in my sky, then. I had hoped to make a powerful statement. But there was no wind, no weeping. I had hoped to make a powerful statement, coupled with a moving plea. But there was no weeping, except, perhaps, concealed weeping. Perhaps they wept inthe evenings, after dinner, in the family room, among the family, each in his own chair, weeping. A certain diffidence still clings to these matters. You laughed, sitting in your chair with your purple plywood spectacles, your iced tea. I had hoped to make a significant contribution. But they remained stony-faced. Did I make a mistake, selecting Bridgeport? I had hoped to bring about a heightened awareness. I saw their smiling faces. They were going gaily to the grocery for peanut oil, Band-Aids, Saran Wrap. My census of tears was still incomplete. Why had I selected Bridgeport, city of concealed meaning? In Calais they weep openly, on street corners, under trees, in the banks. I wanted to provide a definitive account. But my lecture was not a success. Men came to fold the folding chairs, although I was still speaking. You laughed. I should talk about things people were interested in, you said. I wanted to achieve a breakthrough. My penetrating study was to have been a masterly evocation, sobs and cries, these things matter. I had in mind initiating a multi-faceted program involving paper towels and tears. I came into the room suddenly, you were weeping. You slipped something out of sight, under the pillow.
PAUL: A FRIEND OF THE FAMILY
THEN we went over to Pauls place and took the typewriter. Then the problem was to find somebody to sell it to. It was a fine Olivetti 22, that typewriter, and the typewriter girls put it under their skirts. Then George wanted to write something on it while it was under their skirts. I think he just wanted to get under there, because he likes Amelias legs. He is always looking at them and patting them and thrusting his hand between them. "What are you going to write under there, George?" "I thought perhaps some automatic writing, because one cant see so well under here with the light being strangled by the thick wool, and I touch-type well enough, but I cant see to think, so I thought that. . ." "Well we cant sell this typewriter if youre typing on it under Amelias legs, so come out of there. And bring the carbon paper too because the carbon paper makes black smudges on Amelias legs and she doesnt want that. Not now." We all had our hands on the typewriter when it emerged because it had been in that pure grotto, Pauls place, and tomorrow we are going to go there again and take the elevator cage this time, so that he cant come down into the street any more, with his pretensions.
