Page 29
By Jack Joseph Smith
By Jack Joseph Smith
Original Scan
AI Interpretation
The scan-verified page turns arrival in Santa Monica into a reunion with Sparky, Foxie, and Hambone, a transplanted Pittsburgh circle of labor, hustling, music, and old violence.
The cleaned transcript makes the social portrait sharper. The men are introduced through jobs, faces, ambitions, jokes, and memories of knife fighters, while the mention of Gibby and Patrick shifts the reunion from camaraderie toward threat.
Arrival and reunion that doubles as a character roll-call of the transplanted Pittsburgh circle. The last 500 miles came 'in a brand new / big car' to a Santa Monica street where 'rock an roll music' draws the narrator to an open door; 'Sparky', the 'river / boat deck hand with black hair and ... a leather / face', laughs loudest 'at my wardrobe'. Each man is fixed by trade and fate: Sparky 'wanted to be- / come an engineer, so he would change', while 'Foxie was a trash / hauler' and 'Hambone was a dope dealer' whose 'features would never change' - Foxie 'like a fox, or even a hawk', Hambone round-faced and tight-bellied, who 'loved black women'. The talk turns to old 'knife fighter friends turned / football players', 'Hawkery and Briening', now 'All-American' with 'blades ... put across their noses', and the narrator's gnomic 'When at war, only others will die.' It ends ominously on 'The Gibby' - 'He and Patrick must be dead!' - and the question 'just who is Patrick?' Source spellings ('rock an roll', 'Their fine') are preserved.