— Don’t listen to her. You made it all possible.
— But you didn’t write the music. Skedaddle. You didn’t sing it either. Skedaddle. The audience applauded the composer and the singer, but nobody clapped for you. And she says you’re the buffer, but you weren’t the buffer. The singer was the buffer. Skedaddle.
— But you were the power behind the throne.
— Do you want to be behind the throne or on it?
— You are a star either way.
— Don’t patronize her. Her self-esteem is low enough. Always sacrificing. You want to be a translator? Being a translator is a noble business if you’re Baudelaire translating Poe. But you still have to write Flowers of Evil. Or are you expecting her to write all your poems for you? Your name will always be in a smaller font. Why should you sacrifice? I see how much you have inside. Don’t let your hunger eat you up. She takes your friendship for granted. You don’t envy her, you don’t feel jealousy, you don’t feel anything dark inside your heart, when you see that she’s shining because you are her cheerleader with twinkling eyes. You clap, they clap. If I had you, I’d have Leo Castelli by now. I need a Tess.
— Go ahead and take her.
— I could not exploit her like you do. I would encourage her to finish her PhD. Find her own voice. She is your emotional crutch. If you don’t write, you blame her, you spill your coffee, you blame her, you bite your tongue, you blame her. Poor thing, she’s too young to know any better.
— I wonder why she thinks you’re so easy.
— Don’t step in her snare. You’re attacking me to defend yourself.
— You think that if you had a Tess you would have a show at the Whitney. You think Van Gogh was Van Gogh because he had Theo. Theo was Theo because he had Van Gogh.
— You need to do some soul searching. Don’t let yourself be swayed by her every need, cater to your own needs. Establish a reputation with people who can pay you. Octavio Paz, García Márquez. Build a career. Why be a knight errant? Nobody can squeak a peep because you draw your sword to defend her. But artists need to feel frustration in order to create beauty. Unrecognized, she strives, pampered she dies. If you raise ravens, they’ll take your eyes out. And believe me. She’ll leave you blind.
— I’m not a raven. I have no eyes. I’m blind, deaf, and dumb.
— Harmless as a fly. Helpless as a crab claw. You’ve snapped at plenty of people — so skip your innocent poet routine — no one believes it anymore — you’re ambitious. But poetry, poetry has always been the art of the underground. It sees in the dark. And creates at twilight. Beyond twilight, it loses its sight. To shine a light is to bare her stitches. No one wants to see the history of its wounds — the myth is what matters — obscurity and transcendence.
— No wonder — I thought. A black cat had crossed my path. I was on my way to Iris Pagán’s house for a reading that night. There she told me that a dead man was hanging on my neck.
— Rub a raw steak all over your naked body.
— Bloody?
— You can’t avoid it.
— A dead man on me?
— No good comes of him. He rides hunchback.
— I don’t feel him.
But the cadaver started to trigger my imagination. I couldn’t sleep a wink that night. I told you about it.
— Put a bloody piece in a sack with twenty-five cents and chuck it.
— Where?
— On the train tracks.
After bathing with the raw meat that gave me swirly golden hives and rashes on my back, we head straight for Penn Station.
— Did you put the dime inside?
— Twenty-five cents.
— Didn’t she say ten cents?
— No, it was twenty-five with the body in a potato sack.
The departure was called at midnight sharp. We snuck down the stairwell, taking laps down and around the corners — running spooked to death — feeling the pennies jingling and the steak bouncing — until we reached the deserted subway where rats were running along the tracks. You kept a discreet watch while I closed my eyes and threw it:
— Get away. Shoo-shoo. Eat your hex. I’ve got a scarf in my fist, tied in a knot — go choke on the knot of your own wicked plot. Grrrrr. Grunts. Gurgles. Get away. Shoo-shoo. No more harm. Candles white, embers blue, salt, pepper, vinegar too. Get away. Shoo-shoo. Foo on you.
The dead man fell headfirst out of the sack, and toward him came a feverish pack of hungry rats. They smelled the meat. That’s when the train came by and ran over him, but spared the rats lurking under the tracks, and they finished him off.
— How tragic for the dead man. Three times dead.
— Maybe more. Who was it?
— Flesh wants flesh.
— What will our lives offer death?
— Phew, it was an exorcism.
— It was Pancho Corzas.
— He’s dead.
— He wasn’t in mine. The whole world thought he was, but he wasn’t in mine.
— He died in ’84 before your brother.
— You’re wrong. Bianca had thought so too. It turns out it was a ploy for him to paint far from the madding crowd. Better dead. So other painters wouldn’t envy him. His prices soared at Sotheby’s and Christie’s. And, furthermore, while everyone took him for dead, he was doing his best work, tucked away in Europe since ’84. I saw his paintings — the ones he did over there — his swirling yellows stood out from the surrounding blacks, drawn with a magic marker that had the marks of death.
— That’s what must’ve brought him back to life. I’ve always thought the best things happen in the closet.
— You should have seen Bianca’s face when he walked through the door, sober, wearing a French beret. They called me immediately from Mexico. I told Iris Pagán about it.
— Before or after she died?
— After, and she told me she wanted to visit him and see his new series. I felt this dream had something vital to do with me.
— Maybe with joining the world again.
— What do you mean?
— Start working outside.
— No, with my book. I thought the structure was capsizing. It came back to life like Pancho with new visions.
— This book, I’ve always thought so, but now that I’ve actually read it, I’m even more convinced. You’ve created all the corners, now you have to fill them with sculptures, bagatelles, diamonds. What’s the hurry? There’s no rush? It’s a biography. And your life has just begun. You can write other books and keep this one on our nightstand. If you publish it now, how many other dreams, thoughts, fights will come — and you can replace the worst with the best. And the best — it’s a matter of timing — when you continue living — you’ll realize — wait a minute, this fragment I wrote two years ago is obsolete. I’m talking about The Piano when I should be talking of the latest movie in town. That’s how time is. And you’re trying to conquer reality. How are you going to know it’s ended if you are still alive?
— And what do I do with the malicious people who come to me and tell me:
— Did you finish it?
— Almost.
— You have been saying that for years. Did your juices dry up? Watch out, you’re losing credibility. And what about the grants you won to finish it?