What Matters Most is How Well You Walk Through the Fire (13 page)

they were not quite looking at one

another nor were they trying to look

away.

they sat quietly on the uncomfortable

metal chairs in the small

glass-enclosed waiting room.

there must have been

13 or 14 of them

men and women

they looked neither

comfortable nor uncomfortable

as

I stood there

waiting for one of them

to speak

because

I didn't know which one

was the one in charge.

they were all in civilian clothes

and finally I asked:

“pardon me, but could somebody tell

me which room Betty Winters is in?”

“Betty Winters?” asked a man

dressed completely in matching brown.

I noticed he had a large ring of keys

fastened to his belt.

“yes,” I answered, “I've come to

visit her. these are visiting hours,

aren't they?”

there was no answer.

the man in brown got

out of his chair. he looked at

a chart on the wall.

“Betty Winters is in 303 only she's

not there. she took restricted

leave.”

the man in brown walked

back to his chair and

sat down.

the other people had remained

detached and motionless.

I almost asked, “is she coming

back?” but I already knew what

the man in brown knew:

if she didn't return she was

too insane to know she wasn't

sane enough

and if she did return she was

sane enough to know that she was

insane.

Betty Winters had asked me

to come visit her that day.

like most other afternoons

it was a wasted afternoon

for me.

as I walked back down the hall

a man ran along

in front of me. he jumped

and skipped

as he ran along

slapping at invisible marks on the

wall with his hands. he

never seemed to miss. suddenly he

let out a shout

darted into a side room and

without looking back

slammed the door

behind him.

WINE: at present you are buying about 60 bottles

per month

retailing at $5 a bottle

which comes to a total of $300 a month

(plus tax).

if you can cut this down to 30 bottles a month

(one bottle per night) and buy your wine

by the case at 10% discount you will only spend

$135. the amount saved will be approx. $165 per month

or

$1980 yearly!

DINING OUT: at present you go out to eat about

4 nights a week and it costs about $25 a night, including

drinks, which comes to a total of $400 per month. cut
    your

dining out to 2 nights a week and to about $20 each
   night

(much less if you eat Chinese). this will come to

about $160 a month (plus tips). the amount saved will be

approx. $240 a month, or $2880 a year!

TELEPHONE: at present you have been spending about
   $200 per

month. this one's easy: no more long distance calls! this

will cut your expense in half. the amount saved will be
   $100 a month,

or $1200 per year.

RACETRACK: at present you are spending (losing)
   about

$90 a week. Hank, you've just got to figure out

a new betting system, for this comes to $360 per month!

so my dear, by cutting down on wining, dining, long
   distance

calls and losing at the track

you will save approx. $865 a month, or

get this:

$10,380 per year! REALLY!

get ready,

get set,

GO!

Houdini was caught off guard

by a kid

who punched him in the belly

before he was ready.

he hadn't inflated his air vest

yet.

the same thing happened to me

at a party once:

I told this big guy:

“go ahead, hit me in the belly

as hard as you can! I have abs of

steel!”

just then a young girl with beautiful

legs

crossed them

and I caught a glimpse

of miraculous thigh

just as the big guy

drove his fist straight through my

stomach wall.

the pain was almost tranquil

and I couldn't see

then it got real bad

and I lifted my drink

and had some

and a while later

when I could talk

I told the big guy:

“now it's my turn!”

“yeah, right,” he said and vanished into

the crowd.

the girl with the beautiful legs

left early

with somebody else.

later on that night

I drank a pint of whiskey

straight

without stopping.

there was really nothing else left

for me

to do, and I got a

well-deserved

smattering of

applause.

“look,” I say, “you shouldn't have broken in

here, it's just not done…”

“why not? we waited out there for 2 hours.”

“you're taking a chance of getting sliced

from gullet to asshole,” I tell him.

“I often lay here in the dark

and don't want to be

bothered…”

“but I thought we were friends…”

“you shouldn't think. it's harmful.”

“Hank, I haven't painted a thing this year.

I'm hurting.”

“that's your dirty laundry. you're living with your
    mother.

she'll powder your

bunghole…”

“you don't like me, do you?”

“you're always talking about Art,”

I tell him. “I don't like Artists, I don't like

you, I don't like most

people, I don't like door-knockers.

I never knock on any man's door;

I expect the same.”

“do you want me to leave?”

“of course.”

“do you have a five?”

“I don't carry fives.”

“do you have a one?”

“I don't carry ones.”

“do you have any small change?”

“never carry it. holes in my pockets.”

after he leaves I go into the kitchen and see where he
and his

girlfriend broke in. she had sat through the whole
conversation

with a 15 cent Mona Lisa smile on her

face.

I need two new hooks on

the screen. then I go and check my hunting

knife. might be better to gut him

the next time he crawls

through

there.

better for him, better for me,

better for his mother,

better for Art.

I have just spent one-hour-and-a-half

handicapping tomorrow's

card.

when am I going to get at the poems?

well, they'll just have to wait,

they'll have to warm their feet in the

anteroom

where they'll sit gossiping about

me.

“this Chinaski, doesn't he realize that

without us he would have long ago

gone mad, been dead?”

“he knows, but he thinks he can keep

us at his beck and call!”

“he's an ingrate!”

“let's give him writer's block!”

“yeah!”

“yeah!”

“yeah!”

the little poems kick up their heels

and laugh.

then the biggest one gets up and

walks toward the door.

“hey, where you going?” he is

asked.

“somewhere where I am

appreciated.”

then, he

and the others

vanish.

I open a beer, sit down at the

machine and nothing

happens.

like now.

I awaken at 11:30 a.m.

get into my chinos and a clean green shirt

open a Miller's,

and nothing in the mailbox but the

Berkeley Tribe

which I don't subscribe to,

and on KUSC there is organ music

something by Bach

and I leave the door open

stand on the porch

walk out front

hot damn

that air is good

and the sun like golden butter on my

body. no race track today, nothing but this

beastly and magic

leisure, rolled cigarette dangling

I scratch my belly in the sun

as Paul Hindemith

rides by on a bicycle,

and down the street a lady in a

very red dress

bends down into a laundry basket

rises

hangs a sheet on a line,

bends again, rises, in all that red,

that red like snake skin

clinging moving flashing

hot damn

I keep looking, and

she sees me

pauses bent over basket

clothespin in mouth

she rises with a pair of pink

panties

smiles around the

clothespin

waves to me.

what's next? rape in the streets?

I wave back,

go in,

sit down at the machine

by the window, and now it's someone's

violin concerto in D,

and a pretty black girl in very tight pants

walking a hound,

they stop outside my window,

look in;

she has on dark shades

and her mouth opens a little, then she and the
   dog

move on.

someone might have bombed cities for this or

sold apples in the

rain.

but whoever is responsible, today I wish to

thank him

all the

way.

she pulls a large silver mirror

from her purse

and starts to pencil her eyebrows.

the left eye is bruised where she

fell several nights ago.

the afternoon sun comes through the

blinds behind her.

she talks and talks as she doctors

her face: “god damn it, I'm always

falling over the strangest things…

the radiator at home, my sewing

machine, a wastebasket full of empty

tin cans…”

she lifts her drink

still gazing into the silver

mirror…“you're a funny guy, you

know that?…you say things that

nobody else would ever think of

saying…it must feel good to be

verbal that way…”

she spins the mirror in its frame

and blows cigarette smoke through it

like through a revolving door.

“I'm glad you don't like women who

wear pantyhose…it de-cunts a woman…”

the afternoon sun seeps through her

red-brown hair. quickly she crosses

her legs, swings her foot up and

down. she drops the silver mirror

back into her purse, looks up at me—

her eyes very large and the palest

green that I have ever seen, and

down through Georgia and in New Orleans

and up in Maine

the whole world is caught in her glance

and at last

the universe is

magnificent.

moments of agony and moments of glory

march across my roof.

the cat walks by

seeming to know everything.

my luck has been better, I think,

than the luck of the cut gladiolus,

although I am not sure.

I have been loved by many women,

and for a hunchback of life,

that's lucky.

so many fingers pushing through my hair

so many arms holding me close

so many shoes thrown carelessly on my bedroom

rug.

so many searching hearts

now fixed in my memory that

I'll go to my death,

remembering.

I have been treated better than I should have

been—

not by life in general

nor by the machinery of things

but by women.

but there have been other women

who have left me

standing in the bedroom alone

doubled over—

hands holding the gut—

thinking

why why why why why why?

women go to men who are pigs

women go to men with dead souls

women go to men who fuck badly

women go to shadows of men

women go

go

because they must go

in the order of

things.

the women know better

but often chose out of

disorder and confusion.

they can heal with their touch

they can kill what they touch and

I am dying

but not dead

yet.

when the phone rings it's usually a man's

voice and it's like most other voices because

it usually says the same thing:

“are you Henry Chinaski, the writer?”

“I'm a sometimes writer.”

“listen, I'm surprised you're listed. well,

I want to come over and talk to you, have a

few beers with you.”

“why?” I ask.

“I just want to talk.”

“you don't understand,” I say, “there's nothing

to talk about. talking brings me down.”

“but I like your writing.”

“you can have that.”

“I just want to come over and talk

awhile.”

“I don't want to talk.”

“then why are you listed?”

“I like to fuck women.”

“is that why you write?”

“I'm like Truman Capote. I write to pay the

rent.”

I hang up.

they phone back.

I hang up.

I don't see what writing has to do with

conversation.

I also don't see what writing has to do with my

getting 3 bad books of poetry a week

in the mail.

I'm not a priest.

I'm not a guru.

I probably have more bad moments and self-

doubt than any of those who

phone me.

but when there's a knock on the door

and a creature of beauty enters

(female)

(after phoning)

hesitant

smiling

with delightful curves and magic movements

I realize

she is more dangerous than

all the armies of all time and

I know I didn't write my poems for that

and then I'm not sure

and then I don't know again

and then I forget about knowing

I get her a drink

then go into the bedroom and

take the phone off the

hook.

that's the best way to get

unlisted.