Genre: Lyric Essay
I found a copy of “14th Street Gold” in the hallway of my loft building. It was in a box of things to the left of the freight elevator. Because I can never pass free books without at least reading the back cover, I stopped and examined the books. “The War of Art,” I took and have yet to read because I’m afraid I’ll find a battle I didn’t know was there. “Full Frontal Feminism: A Young Woman’s Guide to Why Feminism Matters” is sitting on my desk right now. I think I took it because I thought it would make me laugh when I, or perhaps guests to my home, might later see it on the coffee table. I have never truly laughed at its sight, but the memory of anticipating laugher is something enough to keep it. And then there is “14th Street Gold.” I took it because there was no back cover to read. There is only a cardstock covering with a child’s illustration of a mermaid and the title “14th Street Gold” written in a Microsoft Word font. The letters have festive curls in the ‘S’ and ‘G’ and ‘o.’ I didn’t open the book for two weeks after finding in my hallway.
A few days before this, walking down Grattan Street approaching Morgan Avenue, I heard a few scuffed-steps behind me, observed a shadow in the gold streetlight, and felt a soft-knuckled fist land on the right side of my face. I fell forward with the blow. It was late, I was tired, and I turned and looked in the face of the owner of the fist.
“Can you describe his appearance?” He was taller than me. “Please use his name.” Kenneth Wallace. Kenneth, the first of the boys to throw his fist into my head; he was taller than me. His face was expressionless. When I turned and saw his face, it was expressionless, stunned, as though he couldn’t believe he’d done it. He couldn’t believe he punched me in the head. But he did, and he choked back that sentiment and did it again.
“You don’t have to tell all this to the grand jury. When you testify you can tell them the skeleton of the story, just the straightforward version. For instance, when I ask what he looks like, you’ll answer: He was a tall, heavy-set Hispanic male, approximately 225 pounds.” He was a tall, heavy-set Hispanic male, approximately 225 pounds – he couldn’t believe he punched me in the head, but he did it again.
He did it several times, and I kept looking up at him. And then there were the others.
It is the following week and my face has taken on Kenneth’s same expressionless veil. It is the week of my 24th birthday and still slightly expressionless, I lay in bed. I am nursing my headache with soft music. I run my fingers across the spines of books I have yet to read. I notice the thin spine of “14th Street Gold” and open the cardstock book with the crude illustration of a mermaid on the cover. I read inside and find that the illustration of the mermaid on the cover was not done by a child but drawn by “Retired Adults from the 14th Street Y.” Literally, quite a few retired adults drew the mermaid on the cover. It's an exquisite corpse drawing. The entire book is made up of short writings and several drawings of this nature. Line drawings with smudged creases in the photocopies where the paper had been folded. Someone, a retired adult, began with the bottom – in the case of the cover, a fishes tail. The paper was passed on to another retired adult and continued, the torso, the head. The mermaid drawing made the cover; the others are accompanied by short pieces of writing.
“How many others?” Four, I think. Four, on bicycles. “Did you later learn the names of these individuals?” I tried not to look at the jurors, but they were so close to me. They were so close that to look at them was both impossible and inevitable. I glanced downward and then up in their direction. They were overwhelmingly Hispanic and female, or that’s what I saw – just the skeleton of their stories. “Mr. Ames, did you later learn the names of any of the other four men on bicycles?” I did. “Please state their names.” Just one, Stephen Delgado. “Please describe Stephen Delgado for the jury.” He was, he is… he’s a small framed Hispanic male, approximately 125 pounds. “And what was Stephen Delgado doing while Kenneth Wallace continued to punch you in the head?” He stood over me, he looked down and sneered. His voice was angry, confident for his build. I’m going to shoot you now. I’m going to kill you. You’re going to die now.
I lay in bed and flip through the pages of “14th Street Gold” and start reading a poem by Myra K. Baum. I note to myself that the name does not sound like a any sort of famous writer. Or at least not the name of a writer whose poems I have read before. It sounds like the name of a retired adult who is about to try and write a poem. The poem is called “Home.”
Edge of the road
Where I live now
Is a narrow place
Between
All Gone Life
And One Not Yet Born
I scan her words. Her choice of no punctuation, of capitalization. I imagine, stupidly, her gray hair, her aged hands, her sad eyes.
Life’s companion
Absent
Daily airings
Of major and minor
Absent
Broadening of self
Through another’s love
Absent
Slipping over the Edge
Retreating, recovering
Again and again
Growing the unborn
New Life
An elderly, Caucasian female, approximately 60 years old. A retired adult. I’ve been doing this for the past days since my testimony. I spent eight hours in the courthouse that day. I had my birthday party the following evening. My friends, Annie and Josh, whose house I had just left before I came to know the fists of Kenneth Wallace, the confident voice of Stephen Delgado, the shadows of the men who stood over me as Kenneth punched, and Stephen yelled… Yes, my friends, Annie and Josh; they came to my birthday party. They were sweet and kind and hugged me and said they were so sorry. I called Annie’s phone as I laid in the street that night, trying to recover myself, breathing heavily into the phone. She was alarmed, asked if they went towards her house, she stayed calm. A young, red-haired, Caucasian female of short-stature, approximately calm and sweet. Josh understood the conversation as he laid in the bed beside her. He ran to the street. They had indeed gone towards Annie’s street ad were riding on their bikes, said ‘we fucked that white kid up.’ And Josh, a tan-skinned Hispanic male, approximately five-foot-nine, 165 pounds, saw them, couldn’t believe what they had done, choked back his urge to do the same, and called the police.
I flip the page and see more four-pieced creatures, creased and awkwardly proportioned. Next to Myra K. Baum’s poem is an illustration of a man with one closed eye, one opened. He has one hand to the side, as though holding a gun. An small, opened umbrella is at the tip of his index finger. Beyond this is a story by Katy Morgan. Katy Morgan, who wanted (approximately) to be a beatnik and lived with a girlfriend on Greenwich Avenue in the 1950’s. “(We took turns sleeping on the couch… there was no bed.)” She continues…
“We sat around in semi-subterranean rooms listening to would-be poets recite their work, and snapping our fingers in appreciation. We drank what passed for espresso by candlelight (once I happened to glance into the kitchen at the moment when the waiter was spooning Medalglia d’Oro instant espresso into the little cups), and when a gypsy (or so she called herself) offered to tell our fortunes, we went for it. The gypsy inspected my palm, consulted her Tarot cards, and told me with absolute conviction that I was going to get married the next day.”
As I sat in the courthouse I wished I had brought a friend, a book, music to listen to. I spent about an hour waiting for the Assistant District Attorney to speak with me after she brought me to a bench where I would sit for the better part of the day. Across from the bench there were three vending machines. Beside me there was a teenage boy with his father. I listened to their conversation and learned that the boy had his gold necklace and pendant stolen right off his neck while at school. A young Hispanic male wearing glasses, approximately sixteen and not wearing a gold necklace and pendant. Angry, but very cooperative.
As I flip onward, I stop at another four-pieced person. This one has legs like a kangaroo. The torso was drawn, somewhat defiantly, to look like a woman in a flowing blouse. The individual responsible for drawing the head did not draw a thing. There is no head, but beyond this, there is what looks like a floppy hat. Beside this drawing Muriel Gray starts a paragraph long piece entitled “My Greatest Fear.” She writes, “The proper curse for your enemies would be to wish that they are permanently engaged in a lawsuit. In today’s climate of endless litigation that is my greatest fear. Raised to be terminally polite, I have given up and retreated to safety…”
I found The Post sitting next to me after I had dosed off on the bench for just a minute. I flipped through the stories and came to the NYPD Blotter. Momentarily, vanity flushed my swollen face and I looked to see if the story was there, the one about the five young men and me. It is not. Only two of the five males were caught and it might not look good to publish or isn’t news worthy since no one died. Strangely and excitingly, there was a story about a 16 year old that was assaulted in his high school and had his gold pendant stolen. I looked up but the boy and his father are gone and my excitement wanes.
The Assistant District Attorney came to speak to me every hour. “You won’t have to see either of them today. They’re in jail, they won’t testify until Monday.” By Monday, I think, the bruises might be gone. The swelling will go down. My birthday will be over. This will all be over. I will find an expression on my face. Kenneth Wallace will decline to speak to the same jurors. Stephen Wallace will testify, look at those jurors, and say he never even got off his bike. I tried to imagine what his voice would sound like -- less angry, less confidant, maybe pleading.
And on Sunday night, I lay in bed and read “14th Street Gold.” The swelling has gone down, the bruises are almost entirely gone. I lay in bed and read a piece by Eileen D. Kelly called “Guilty Pleasure.” I don’t picture her silver hair, or worn hands, I just read what is plainly written on the page:
“I started reading the column several years ago. Sometimes I look at the age of the person and feel happy that I’m older than the deceased, and I’m still here. I like it when they give a cause of death, so I can say, ‘Well, I don’t have that!’ I don’t like it when it says, ‘unknown cause,’ since I might have that. Other times I see where a woman has died, leaving a husband, someone about my age. Then I’m tempted to find out where he lives and bring him a casserole. I could then get to know him and eventually go out with him. I never do it though, its jut a fantasy. Mostly I’m just glad to see that none of my family or friends are listed there, nor am I. Sometimes I think of writing to the Editor to thank him for sparing me, one more day. But I never do.”
