affinity / Wlod--1995 (long)
Wlodzimierz Holsztynski
affinity
--------
Part I
(1)
on my way
to the golden irs building
on the corner of Market and another street
i pass by a starving Black
artist sitting on the sidewalk
in the wall's warm shadow
that comes
from the roof
a narrow
patch
i modify my plans
make sure to go back from the golden
irs building the same way south
into Market and east into
San Fernando
(2)
i won't buy any
but will create
an impression like
something's happening here
enliven eyes smile an instant:
so that people will gather
for an American he has little patience
when i am lost in the flair of his expressions
i like his impatience breaking thru starvation
no easy treatment for the english challenged
(3)
for one on the left
he wants eight dollars
a painting of flowers
in a transparent vase you can see
the mirror of the water in the vase he paid
two dollars to get
this one from a color copying machine technology
is that good i would never guess
his original he displays close to him is still better
he can add old english calligraphy to his graphics
leaves hanging from letters
i am an artist
i can do my own poems he says
and he smoothly transforms his statement into improvising
scanning flowing rhyming phrases
he knows about internet
(4)
if someone put a pistol to your head
here Michael extends his arm and hand toward my face
you'd improvise too
that's how i feel when i do
a pistol inside my head
if it were a real one
you'd do better
we laugh
when the situation demands it indeed
be it Russia or here
suddenly i do find words
this
reminds me of a small story
at the university of michigan
in 1969 when i came to America
everything reminds me of everything
(5)
i already gave Michael a dollar
he let my green butterfly into his styrofoam white flower
gloomy's the word he agreed
in the mid of the bright San Jose summer
no athlete walking by
no woman
no couple with children
came thru
white flower attracts no more
when you get rich i told him
you will buy me a coffee or beer
you may donate twenty he jokes
and when i get rich
i'll give you forty
i appreciate your dollar
he adds
(6)
put this price tag under that picture (!)
no put it on the sidewalk under the middle!
ok Mike i am slow i am willing trying
i play
I don't want to be patient Mike says and plays
along gives me a sergeant drill routine... he
should write this poem--the sidewalk
is his and mine but english
only his and if
i knew
how to envy
i would
(7)
i may stand three quarters
of the width of the sidewalk away
from Mike pedestrians
go around me anyway
never
between me and Mike
i feel that i exhausted my welcome
no stop tell me your michigan story
(8)
Blacks and students revolted shouted
o pen-it up or shut-it down!
o pen-it up or shut-it down!
i followed a group of Blacks
down a corridor they banged
iron pipes against radiators
opened classroom doors
disrupted classes
Mike nods what were you at the university?
a teacher a professor
of what?
of mathematics
no circus shambo-mambo from Michael
no "i am too stupid for math"
simply straight respect
when i told him earlier that my name is [vwodek]
he repeated it didn't ask me may i
call you walt
i continue
more and more Blacks joined the group
now a crowd in one class
a White guy punched and kicked a Black
Blacks closed and raised their fists
you could smell the blood in the air about
to be spilled
and that's when you took off and disappeared from the scene
Mike helps
i smile i should have left but i felt
responsibility...
I read in newspapers Mike says
you jumped up like a superman
then descended on them and they saw
that you are a professor...
do i look to you like a professor?
yes you do
i shake my head: and i was younger then
Mike insists
no i had to do something
i addressed them in a friendly way
like would address students nearly my age in Poland i said
BOYS!
this time Mike is shocked
especially in those days he says
Blacks had surrounded me had converged
from everywhere huge guys i show
Michael the size of theirs biceps
we are NOT boys they said
the staircase and the corridor and their
solemn faces darkened
ok my english is poor but...
slowly the smile percolates to their eyes
...but blah blah blah problem no more
(9)
that was as close as you ever got to death
Michael says
i can't match Mike as an artist
i spoil his moment of celebrating Blacks
i mention warsaw streetcars and a childhood friend
who lost two legs and one arm and... spare me
the details Michael requests it's hot
the shade is nearly useless Mike
doesn't do too well and i
am not of any help i extend
my hand we shake straight not the "cool"
way straight like our whole conversation
free from slang
but for my introductory
hi man
Part II
(10)
at the moment of parting i know:
now
i'll go
south then east
to the Jack in the Box nearby
on the corner of San Carlos and Fourth
where homeless
smell bad
and play good chess
slow or blitz
i am game
(11)
i didn't cross San Fernando yet
Michael's long bones lying on the sidewalk
thirty feet behind my back
and i modified my plans again
i stop short of the Jack
at the MacDonald's and buy
two large drinks and a twenty piece
chicken MacNugget split 10+10 into two
packages $7.23 i'll celebrate
with Mike
(12)
i have thrown
the irs forms folded
stuffed into an envelope
into a special a yard by a yard
box of a tall child height
in the golden irs building
from home
i brought there the envelope with the forms inside
in a blue plastic bag
nicer than a greenish yellowish brownish
from Lucky's--a local grocery chain store
a habit
no more sport bags for me
i carry everything in plastic
like everybody around here
well everybody that...
and they use the large black ones
anyway
i extract the blue bag from my pocket
at MacDonald's
(13)
i am back
north across the street i see
another transient next to Michael
i change the direction
cross the First east away from Mike
and only then i cross San Fernando i unseen watch
the two of them from my corner from distance
the drinks spilled in my bag
oooh cold but the other bum will not
leave now no he moved to sit down
next to Mike i see
the bum's can
and his clean bright white shirt
Mike could also get new clothes from a local church
i am leaving for my apartment
one handle of the bag breaks
and this blue plastic was not meant to get wet
awkward
END
H.California
1995-08-15