Book of Sketches - Jack Kerouac [35]
thanks —
In America the
birch is grievous,
lost, rich, poetic
— the woods are
haunted — a meaning
was united in this
bleak — I know
the dead Dutchman
of Saybrook never
cared for the
name Kirouac —
but I have cared
for ye dutchmen —
It is my prerogative
to believe, in my
own way, in what
haunts my conscience
& fulfills my hope —
I know there’s nothing
down the line but
gray indifference, the
earth-covering excrescence
of mean men —
That I was born into
a beastly world with
all the traits in
myself — & God
will crown my head
with grave dung —
but I have sung
the pale rainy lakes
in this chokéd craw
of mine & will
sing again — &
mine enemies look
me in the eye
if they will, or
be still
The moon’s
dropping a
tired pious
drape
A Whitman song
of New England in
Winter! — the
coasts, the white
sprays of shipping off
N.B., the r.r. brakeman’s
eyes slitting in the
long New London dawn
— the covered bridges
of Vermont, tunnels
of love of old hay
rides in other harvest
moons — The shiney
snake in the bog,
the mad bongoeer
in the dark shore
of Nancy Point —
the blue windows of
mills, of Boston ware-
houses — Wink of Chinee
neon in Portland Maine
A big piece of myself is stuck
is choking me in my throat
My belief in the Holy Ghost
less and less — it’s fading
— It must not fade, but
return — Return, Holy Ghost
March 30 1953
PLANS FOR NEW WRITING
“Newspaper accounts”
of what happened, short
ones or long “novel” ones,
with moral theme . . . since
that is the final question,
do we live or die bleak.
— Fullscale explanations
in unpausing sometimes
hallucinated prose, of
these things, —
(No — continue with
Duluoz Legend)
Spring in Long Island
Not a blue sky clean
Spring but a mixed
new-haze day smelling
of faint Spring smokes
— a chill wind
makes washlines sway
— a gray horizon, a
radiant sun behind
clouds — in little
snake mottled trees
balls of Spring bole
hang like decorations,
wave —
Six million diesels
churring & vibrating
in the yards, waiting
for fueling — The
tenderness pale clouds
that in the exact
zenith mix with
the pale pure
blue — Among the
bushes the carpet of
caterpillar hair —
The basketball
players of the
open cement court
are wheeling &
whistling — a ball’s
suspended in air, a
Scandinavian sweatered
youth is stiffnecked
watching it, others
in attitudes of
twistback & turn,
“Ya-y-y-y” —
— gesturing, talking —
watchers have arms
on knees — a ball
is bounced —
A mother works
eagerly in this
orgone ozone
day pushing a
teeny child in the
park swing — She
wont throw him
down the airshaft
— she says “It’s
chilly here” —
Figures on the
plain of the park
in various throwings,
strollings, pushings
of carriages,
scufflings, the
graceful walk of
a beautiful young girl
who doesnt care —
How can an old
man like me
devour what she has,
it is a nameless
newness insouciance
& style as ephemeral
as gain, as heartbreaking
to see as loss
— as lost to
me as smoke
or the smell of
this day —
nothing there is
left for me, for us,
but loss — yet we
choke & gain after
races & rush &
nothing’s to come
of it but tick
tack time —
A little paper on
the cement is
just as glad
as I am, just
as won —
Young girls in Levis
with little asses,
little pliant waists
& ribs wrapt in
gray jacket coats, —
green skirts —
I see them walking
off with the huge
LIR R coal bunker
as their backdrop
— But yet I
aim to write books
believing in life How?
In the heat of my
blood it all comes
out & good enough
& like birth —
It still isnt
Spring, the wind
in my neck’s
not April’s,
March’s —
insistent, beastly,
knifing — Ah
cars! Ah airplane!
SKETCH
Behind big engine 3669
in the bright day of
San Luis Obispo the
mtns. of hope rise
up, treed, green, sweet
— a rippling palm
behind the pot steams —
the young fireman of
Calif. waiting to
make the hill up to
the bleakmouth panorama
plateau of
Margarita where
stars of night are holy