Downtown
Trolleys and buses were still running, but
much good they did us: every one was
jammed, people leaping up to hang on
by their fingernails and belts; The gripmen in
the cable cars, fiercely focused, fought to keep their balance and
not plow through the people surging into and
across the streets, while the conductors
had given up pretending to take fares.
The one whose eye I caught shrugged
and smiled wider, and as he turned away,
yelling joyously to the crowds inside the tram
and out, I saw war’s heavy hand on him,
to the shoulder of his jacket,
and turned away myself, quickly.
So we walked, swept up in crowds and kissed
by soldiers; somewhere south of Market
we lost Edna; she didn’t turn up for
three days. Ruby kept a firm grip
on Nora, who barely kept her feet, while Mary
On First a harried hotel doorman told
a soldier with a girl on his arm
that they were full up; “You are?” the man said.
“Well, I’m fed up. The trains have stopped, you know;
we need a place to stay.” The doorman
eyed them; the fellow said, Not
together; he was just escorting this lady
through the crowd. Just then, another man
slipped up behind the doorman, whispered briefly,
and slid away. The doorman cleared his throat,
clasped his hands. “Actually,”
he said, “it appears we do have space. Due to
(Just then a flying soldier’s cap sailed over
(he removed the cap) “the stoppage of trains,
the management has decided to open the ballrooms
to guests. One for gentlemen, and one for the ladies.
You will get a blanket and” (he coughed;
miserable over this meager offering,
he coughed again, his self-imposed task
to reconcile a blanket on the floor
he finished desperately, “for a dollar.”
“Eight bits?” The soldier cocked his head and got
the lady’s nod; the doorman bowed them in.
“Come on,” said Mary, dragging on my arm,
so moving after her, my head still turned
to watch the hotel door swing slowly shut,
on that cool quiet world within,
all paisley and plaid, scattering confetti from her purse.
“Are you all right, dear? What a time! Lord,
isn’t this a time! Good thing I’m fat,
you bounced right off! Have some confetti, dear.”
She pressed it into my limp hands (if she’d
thought to stick it in my mouth, well fine;
I probably hadn’t wit to object,
and my mouth, I’m sure, hung open) and sailed
off through the crowd, crying, “Spread the joy,
“Spread the joy!” yelled the fellow in uniform (army), one
of three, who grabbed and kissed me. Another
had got hold of Jane, I saw, but where were Nora and
Mary grabbed Jane’s shirt in one hand and
my arm in the other, and the third soldier,
reaching for her, fell back sharply.
“Did you kick him?” I gasped, but she
spun to look after him, this time into a tall
thin man in formal wear, his cummerbund
aglint with metal and ribbon. “My son’s,” he said, as Mary
pulled at me. “He died, that we might live.”
Below tear-filled eyes, his lips squirmed, like two
slugs writhing; that was not what I should
be thinking, I thought, and dragged my
shameful gaze away and asked, “What was his name?”
His face clouded, then cleared;
“He died, that we might live.” His lips started again
their awful twitch and pulse; I put my head down,
and bullied after Mary over paper-paved streets, the pages
sifting down from rooftops where ecstatic celebrants
tossed them by the handful or (the more exuberant
amongst them) dumped whole boxfuls on
I worked my shifts both that night and the next
—war’s end did not heal its wounded—
and slept between, smuggling cafeteria
food to Mary, who slept nights in my bed
while I was on the wards. She said they wouldn’t
miss her at the office; “And anyway,
I doubt there’s much call for typists now; I bet
if you looked hard enough, you’d find the letterhead
of Perkins, Balmore, Straap and Fitch somewhere
on Market Street, trampled black.”
in Thursday morning’s paper, eleven had died
in riots the day before, we stared at each other
over our orange juice. “Good god,” said Mary.
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