Page:Big Sur (1963).djvu/85

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A roaring drinking bout begins deep in the canyon—Fog nightfall sends cold seeping into the windows so all these softies demand that the wood windows be closed so we all sit there in the glow of the one lamp coughing in the smoke but they dont care—They think it’s just the steaks smoking over the fire—I have one of the jugs in my hand and I wont let go—McLear is the handsome young poet who's just written the most fantastic poem in America, called “Dark Brown,” which is every detail of his and his wife’s body described in ecstatic union and communion and inside out and every-whichaway and not only that he insists on reading it to us—But I wanta read my “Sea” poem too—But Cody and Dave Wain are talking about something else and that silly kid Ron Blake is singing like Chet Baker—Arthur Ma is drawing in the corner, and it sorta goes like this generally:—

“That’s what old men do, Cody, they drive slowly backwards in Safeway Supermarket parking lots”—“Yes that’s right, I was tellin you about that bicycle of mine but that’s what they do yes you see that’s because while the old woman is shoppin in that store they figure they'll park a little closer to the entrance and so they spend a half hour to think their big move out and they back in out slowly from their slot, can hardly turn around to see what’s in back, usually nothin there, then they wheel real slow and trembly to that slot they picked but all of a sudden some cat jumps in it with his pickup and them old men is scratchin their heads

sayin and whining ‘Owww, these young fellers nowadays’ and all that obvious, ah, yes, but that BICYCLE of

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