Novel

“Public judgment,” Marianne said,
Back in New York one morning.
Not really a friend, if what you mean
By friend is someone who confides
As well as listens. I was coming to her with
The wonder of what I had done, four years

Of solitude, this novel growing and growing,
And now the entrée to this powerful agent.
My befuddlement over the sample to submit
Before leaving all 1300 pages with her assistant,
Then hightailing it out of there in fear
Of being arrested for expressing myself on paper
In the way that I did. The feeling that I had
Dropped off a bomb.

Marianne moving me away from the sandblast
Operation going on at the corner building, men
On scaffolding in their gear. “Facelifts can be
Toxic,” Marianne said, before disappearing.

Overseas now I have just come from an Internet café
And a failed attempt to access my e-mail.
Looking for the reply from her, the agent,
Figuring she will send it when I’m out of town,

The note that says we don’t want you,
No one of our stature ever will.

A blind man on the corner, and people lining up
For directions. Portugal, a place I’m getting to know.

October 2002