You Tell Me Now – I Didn’t Do It!?
I spent my life at war with my father-
And never knew why. But somehow I always felt it was my fault
And didn’t know how.
As a two year old I broke my back, my hip,
And both my legs,
And spent two years in a cast from my
Armpits to my toes.
I was told I’d done it jumping over the hoses of the wringer washer.
I thought, I must be stupid, or jinxed
Or cursed to do that to myself.
I spent my life enduring tense silences
In my father’s presence,
Anticipating the cuff to the nose, the ear, the back of the head.
For something I did or didn’t do, or what
Someone said I did. When he laughed in my presence I felt
Blessed, forgiven, pardoned.
But sooner or later he’d look at me,
As if to say, “What are you laughing at?”
As I grew older I began to stay away,
Run away, create a life outside.
A life on the edge of the crowds, away
From the voices, away from the eyes.
Inside myself I was anyone else, someone
Who wasn’t judged for I knew not what.
I would wander neighborhoods where I
Knew no one, and no one knew me.
I would wander the freight yards
And the waterfront, where no one wanted to be.
Those abandoned and used up places
And spaces were where I found freedom.
The stray cats and dogs, the rats under the logs,
The pigeons who could fly…
Who would flap their wings and the snap
Of air would break them free of the earth.
They became the people in my private world,
My safe place, my peaceful haven.
Then we moved away from the waterfront,
At the age when rock and roll, and girls
And gangs and fights and late nights
On the corner, on the avenue, became my place,
Away from home, away from him,
Where I could take some power.
From a brown flat bottle, with fire water
To burn away the pain while it wrenches my guts.
Where I would be empowered by the trust
Of a big eyed girl, who would let me hold her
Breasts, and squeeze my fingers down into her
Warm wet secret place, as my blood
Was cut off at the wrist by an incredibly tight
Waist-band as we trembled and kissed and
Dry humped our way to the edge of the
Universe in a cold winters hallway where
We created enough heat to melt away the loneliness.
Where I could steal away the power
Of others on the late night streets.
With a fence picket up side the head
Or a slim-jam knife, bought in a jokeshop for two bucks
Broke off in the ribs of a kid who looks, and
Runs, and fears just like me.
Until one day, after graduating
To knocking down grown men, strangers with families,
Fathers to someone unknown to me. I look at
My father, as he comes toward me with
Fists balled and mouth grimaced. I
Lash out with my crutch, drive it into his
Soloplexus.
The crutch that comes from a life time of
Leg and back injuries all the way back
To that two years in a body-cast, when
I was two years old.
Have you ever seen a two year old jump?
I’ve got three kids. At two years old
Not one of them could ever jump
High enough, long enough, to break a back,
A hip, both legs, weird huh?
How I was able to do that…?
The day I hit my father with the crutch,
We fought, from the hall, to the bedroom, to the pantry, to the kitchen,
Punching each other like mortal enemies,
There was no other awareness of life, the world, this afternoon,
Nothing outside of this space between us, his face,
The things we crashed into. My brother on my back
Choking me, punching me to the ear and cheek
Screaming “leave him alone”
We never talked after that, until the day
He told me to get a job or move out of the apt.
At sixteen I did both.
I spent the summer working as a
Construction laborer on the City Square subway tunnel
I lied about my age for the job, and for the
Furnished room on Park street behind the Dot Theater.
A room with a bed, finally, beautiful Donna-
We had a bed.
Instead of doorways and alleys and backseats
We could undress and make love as the gods intended
We made plans on that bed. Donna would
Finish teacher’s college, I would join the military.
When we had both finished, we would marry.
She went to teacher’s state on Huntington Avenue,
I went to bootcamp. It was September, 1963
Home on leave in December it was back to doorways
And hallways and backseats with
Hot lips and frozen ears, steaming genitalis and frostbit toes.
Then I to Florida and she back to schools, we wrote and phoned and planned in secret,
Because her father was a cop, and he knew
All about kids who came from “that” neighborhood.
So I went to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
And she continued school, working part time in a bank.
A year later I came home to shore duty in R.I.
I joined the boxing team so that I could have more
Liberty time, to rush home from Davisville
To meet Donna on Huntington Ave. and ride the
Subway to Fields Corner, to rush to our houses
To eat, then to meet and love and make wet spots
On the floor between our feet in someone
Elses doorway, or hallway –
Then I got orders to South East Asia – what
The hell is South East Asia!?
We go to infantry training in North Carolina
And hear rumors of a place called Vietnam.
And then we’re there, and its hot and its
Scary, beautiful and vicious, wet and deadly.
I send home kimonos and chinese silk dresses
And write that I’m alright –
But then the villages are burnt and bulldozed
And there’s no place to buy the gifts and I’m not alright.
And after a while I can’t write anymore
Not to Mom, not to Donna. I see nothing that I want to tell them.
I smoke dope and take speed and stay up all night
Only my eyes can hold back the fright.
Concertina wire and claymores and night flares
And exploratory fire aren’t enough anymore.
“They” own the night.
And the days are for napping, wisecracking and
Backslapping and waiting for the night, and I just
Can’t write.
Then one day I’m on a Pan Am jetliner
Cushioned seats and air conditioning and its been
Seven months since I’ve written a letter,
But now I’m on my way home.
I’m on my fucking way home on an air conditioned
Plane with a white woman stewardess and
Rum and coke and ice cubes and my pants
Are caked with mud and blood and my shirt
Is stuck to my back and crusty in the armpits
And my nose is mashed and swollen on my face
The twentysix stitches throbbing across the
Purple and maroon bags under my eyes-
But we don’t go home.
I’m in Okinawa, twenty days
Of doing nothing but waiting around a barracks,
In limbo, with guys from all over eye core (“I” corps)
But every night I’m on the strip-a front gate paradise of
Flashy bars and pseudo-rock and roll and
Asian bar girls who take me into hot tubs and
Saunas and soak the red mud out of my skin,
The money out of my wallet and the tension out of
My bones but they can’t touch the pictures
The pictures I see when I close my eyes,
“they” still own the nights –
Then I’m at El Toro, Long Beach and L.A
And on up to Treasure Island, San Francisco
Where I’m mustered out and I still haven’t
Written or called home, not to Mom, not to Donna
Six of us from my outfit hang around
‘Frisco for days, then weeks, smoking dope and
Letting time slip away until one by one we
Start leaving .
I hitch hike cross-country stopping
Where ever invited or where ever I crash while
Stoned along the way till one day I’m let out of
A car along the Mass. Pike in a western suburb
Of Boston that I’d never been in before and find
my way via trolley and subway into the city-
to Fields Corner and Ditson street – …
…To a warm welcome at the candy store
then across the street to my apartment building
where I meet a very large German shepherd on
the front steps doing his job as a watchdog,
till a young girl tenant comes out and puts
him at ease.
I climb the stairs to the third floor,
The door is locked, I move the large steamer trunk
And open the door leading into the bedroom my
Brother and I once shared, pushing the bunk bed
With the door till I can squeeze in.
I exit the bedroom to the living room, can
See through the dining room, pantry, kitchen,
All empty.
The only sound is the fridge and the
Floor creeking under my feet. I feel as though
I’m in a miniature copy of the home I once
Lived in.
I enter the long hall and pass the doors to the
Bedrooms on my way to the bathroom at the end.
As I get to the bathroom door I look into my
father’s room on my left. There he is, in bed,
legs bent and crossed with his dick hanging out
of his B.V.D.’s doing a crossword puzzle.
He looks small, pale, flabby and ragged, I say
Hi, and wait expectantly, feeling a smile coming up
In me. He says…
“What are you doing here?”
and I feel the smile turn to granite and
spread through my jaw and temples, chest
and legs. I turn and walk down the hall,
out the door, down the stairs and sit on
the front steps with my new found friend, a
Lithuanian German shepherd, waiting for someone
To come home.
Time passed, I went to work as an ironworker,
Donna was going to school and working in the bank.
I lived at home and our wedding plans were
made known to all. Her father started fixing up
the third floor apartment in the house on Dakota street
where she was raised. I was even offered an
easy in on the Boston Police Dept., I declined, but
that was okay because her uncle was the
business agent of the ironworkers union and my
brother-in-law, Chico, was a very popular journeyman.
I knew where I was gonna grow old. I
Actually started thinking of Donna and myself
As a married couple.
We bought a diamond ring at Horne’s jewelers
We had a bank account where she worked, we had a
1965 mustang convertible.
Then one day my father had a heart attack
On his way to work. They took him off the train
At Andrew Square subway station and he died at
City hospital shortly after my mother, one of my brothers
And I got there.
We never did make peace, just detante. I was
Afraid for my mother, sisters and brothers, and angry,
furious. “This asshole’s gonna die and fuck up my life…?”
The next day on the way to the morgue
To pick up his personal effects, I bump shoulders
With some guy who then says something and I
Attack him right there at the busiest intersection
In town. Downtown Crossing, full of shoppers from
Jordan’s and Filene’s and Gilchrist’s. I actually
try to throw him through the window into Filene’s.
Cops are always there and I’m soon subdued,
Cuffed, and my friend Jerry Foley explains the
Circumstances and where we are going. They let me go.
I don’t know what happened to the guy I was trying
To slam through a plate glass window.
I get to the morgue and pick up his stuff in a
Second hand brown paper bag. His boots, belt, gray
Work pants, longshoreman’s hook, scully cap, an empty wallet.
No money, just some dog-eared cards. No drivers license, he
Never had a car, no credit cards, he only paid cash. I don’t
Remember a shirt or jacket.
Then I’m home lying on the bottom bunk crying
And Donna is there comforting me, later its only
Family and Donna is cooking as though she’s
Been there always.
Then comes the wake. At a funeral parlor on
Adams Street across from police station eleven.
I’m standing against the wall at the threshold
Between the casket room and a sitting room watching
All these people, family, relatives, strangers all in
Dresses and suits that only come out for such occasions.
Working people in suits look as uncomfortable
As the guy in the coffin. Some guy in one of
Those suits comes up and takes my hand, as
Thought I’d just been pointed out to him.
“You’re the son that was in Vietnam? He talked
about you all the time.”
The next thing I know I’m in the doorway of
Adams appliance store next door being held by my
Father’s cousin and I don’t know who is comforting
Who-
Then there’s the next day – a funeral mass in
St. Peter’s and a burial in a suburban cemetery that
I couldn’t find again if I had to.
Time passes, Mom gets a nice apt., on
Arcadia St., oak floors and sunny windows,
Life gets nice. Only four of the younger
Kids still in school and at home. Donna
And mom are close. I’m busting my
Ass ironworking , making big money. Donna’s
At mom’s every night when I come home
From work, I doze in the tub while they make
Supper – Then mom buys a house in Maine
For her and the younger kids, myself and Mert.
My trucker brother-in-law are moving the
Furniture up there over the weekend. Donna
Goes to the cape (cod) with a girlfriend. Mert
And I return to the city Sunday afternoon.
There’s a message for me at the candy store,
Call my sister Ree, a.s.a.p/emergency.
It’s Donna. There’s been an accident. That’s
All she’ll tell me. I drop the phone and run
The twenty blocks to Ree’s apt. and she
Tells me. Donna’s dead.
I went a little nuts. The rest is history.
Years later, I’m past forty and doing life
In prison and my mother, through one
Of my brothers, tells me that I
Didn’t do it. I didn’t bust myself up
And into a cast for two years, when
I was two.
My father was pissed about something
And threw me from the kitchen to the
Living room, here I bounced off the
Wall by the front door.
What would I have done if I’d known the
Truth while he was still alive? What would
My life have been if I’d known I didn’t do it,
He did?
Tom Manning 1994