Page 37

By Jack Joseph Smith

High Wateh No matter of your good fortune, or lack of; when you walk across a penny on the pavement, and don't pick it up,, the idea of luck has you deminished, and so has the universe's view of your person No one on the run has ever crossed the widest of fields without looking bothe ways, and who are these dark skinned Earl Flinn's anyway?

Original Scan

AI Interpretation

GPT

The poem turns a dropped penny into a test of fate, self-regard, and whether the world still recognizes a person's standing.

Its logic is deliberately strange but controlled. Small neglect becomes metaphysical evidence: if you pass over luck, the idea of luck has you deminished and even the universe may revise its opinion of you. The closing image of "dark skinned Earl Flinn's" keeps the page restless and unstable, ending in a question that sounds suspicious, comic, and vaguely threatened all at once.

Claude

High Wateh short version: the pavement penny, the dark skinned Earl Flinn's returning as a question, no runner crossing fields without looking both ways.