Patricia Smith – Ⅱ
Character Study
As soon as I scripted a line that blessed him
with a functioning heart, he ambled naked
out of my novel, squeezed his squirming head through
the space in a double-spaced line. Then he gaped
at me, eyes wounded by my indecision.
He shoved at a weakened verb and ripped the prose
wide open, bled twisted smell on the keys, laughed
maniacally at the optimistic
progression of page numbers. His searching mouth,
which had been written as both empty howl and
open door slammed shut, was crammed with misplaced teeth.
He was nude and ashy, swathed in stiff denim,
his voice gravel, then rootless and defiant,
his eyes pulsed gray, bottomless black, flat green
with flecks of spittle, his height wavered, his flat
tattooed gut pouted, then didn’t. He was scarred
by every change I had made, every strike-through,
cut/paste, backspace, delete, all of the unleased
betrayal that roars through prose. I had built him
from a knowing of adjectives, then piled on
detail and declaration, and now he is
overdone, dragging all that weight and wheezing
when he breathes. The boy patiently loads pockets
with stones, bottle caps and jagged shards of glass,
waiting for the moment when the skin of my
neck is exposed. Only 11, he scans
me with man eyes and says it, claiming my nights,
advancing the plot in a way that we both
know can’t be undone. He says: Give me a name.
As soon as I scripted a line that blessed him
with a functioning heart, he ambled naked
out of my novel, squeezed his squirming head through
the space in a double-spaced line. Then he gaped
at me, eyes wounded by my indecision.
He shoved at a weakened verb and ripped the prose
wide open, bled twisted smell on the keys, laughed
maniacally at the optimistic
progression of page numbers. His searching mouth,
which had been written as both empty howl and
open door slammed shut, was crammed with misplaced teeth.
He was nude and ashy, swathed in stiff denim,
his voice gravel, then rootless and defiant,
his eyes pulsed gray, bottomless black, flat green
with flecks of spittle, his height wavered, his flat
tattooed gut pouted, then didn’t. He was scarred
by every change I had made, every strike-through,
cut/paste, backspace, delete, all of the unleased
betrayal that roars through prose. I had built him
from a knowing of adjectives, then piled on
detail and declaration, and now he is
overdone, dragging all that weight and wheezing
when he breathes. The boy patiently loads pockets
with stones, bottle caps and jagged shards of glass,
waiting for the moment when the skin of my
neck is exposed. Only 11, he scans
me with man eyes and says it, claiming my nights,
advancing the plot in a way that we both
know can’t be undone. He says: Give me a name.
