Saturday, July 17
Four Days
When Robert Kincaid dies, his attorney sends
Francesca Johnson a box with his things in it.
A bracelet, a necklace she had given him, some photographs
and letters, and a privately printed book called Four Days.
This book showed to her he was an artist. Not just a photojournalist.
Or maybe it was published in a limited edition, or was a trade book
that didn’t sell. There are a lot of those. When she dies, her children discover
she had an affair with him while they were at the state fair with their father.
She left three journals chronicling the event, and what it meant to her.
They are surprised by this. It causes them to reflect on their own
marital situation and relation with their children.
She asks to be cremated and her ashes scattered
off a bridge that meant something to
the two of them. They honor her wish.
Their father had her and she had
her memories. Meryl Streep,
Clint Eastwood.
Thoreau left his journal
in a wooden box the size of
a steamer trunk. Who did he leave it to?
To everyone. That is, to no one. That’s a subtheme of
The Bridges of
we die alone. Or we have our private lives, but we have to
keep them to ourselves. They’re private. Personal.
Not for public consumption. I wrote a book called
THE VOLCANOES OF
Unpublished. Was it satire? Was it longing
and regret? Was it unfinished? Am I
still writing it? I don’t have a bracelet.
I have a silver dollar from the Shawnee Indian Nation.
Louis –
The signtalker. I have a Timex camper watch
with an o. d. nylon band. Olive drab.
I have a wedding ring. Gold. Probably can’t
get it off my finger. I have a sea-bean collection.
I found them walking on the beach. Writing poems
in my head. Poems I wrote down and printed up.
I don’t know what happened to the poems.
They’re back there in the stack somewhere.
Men lead lives of quiet desperation.
I had a wife and family. I loved them.
I wasn’t a very good provider.