revision
TRANSCRIPT
RevisionAuthor(s): Denis JohnsonSource: The Iowa Review, Vol. 2, No. 3 (Summer, 1971), pp. 10-11Published by: University of IowaStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20157732 .
Accessed: 17/06/2014 02:00
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REVISION
From out of the mail jumps
gloom so you try to tell
it something funny, a
joke maybe, you write:
"Hilarious! Love,
Desperate," and cross out
Desperate, hoping a
more novel sound will arise
from the packed snow, lie,
truth, no matter, as long as what is wrong will be
turned right by the word
arising. You write Hopeful,
hoping for that quality, Troubled, seeking the shock
of recognition, write,
think, cross, write, drink, pee, you are
truly Desperate,
Hopeful, Troubled, certain
there exist syllables that will turn upon themselves, send gyrating the heart of the creditor, until he perceives the
snow building its trees beneath
the snow, comprehends its
whiteness, knows your own
purity, turns backward
to see what he has been, one fouling the mails with gloom
10
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and the world with his
refusals. This is the
word you are after, you
begin to hear its sounds,
muffled, da-da-da, you see what it means now, feel
the fingers of it, da
da-da, altering your heart's places, its shape now
darkest upon you, your voice, the breath's arc now, good;
fine, saying, so much better.
11 Denis Johnson
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