Page 113

By Jack Joseph Smith

From Four to Four in L.A. I smacked up my 1950 Plymouth Named Empty Closet by Scarecrow White... Actually that was after drinking 26 approximent pints of Lancer's Vin Rose at the Santa Monica Boat House with Mister Animal and The Prankster However I got to Freeway Fuller To watch Eric Hoffer on T.V. with his philosophy With that Fuller and I departed to the Venice midnight beach for a gallon of Red Mountain in the mude in the waves Later I went to be alone at the flat of Conneely, and sat down at a wicker table by a window somewhat attached to the stroller cement before the sand And began what turned out to be 300 pages of memory On the spot; I might have captured the diary of it all But was interupted by a phone call from El Paso It was Animal and Prankster They'd flown up to Texas for the worship of the binder And were in a movie theatre Giggling at Bonnie and Clyde It was four in the morning From a four in the afternoon beginning But even after hanging up I couldn't go to sleep For while in the last American city I started to see My own American contemporary brain

Original Scan

AI Interpretation

GPT

A drunken, rambling night in Los Angeles becomes the start of a 300-page memory project and a moment of suddenly seeing one's own mind as part of America.

The poem moves through wine, cars, freeway television, beach drinking, a late-night apartment, and a phone call from Texas with the loose, accumulating energy of someone talking while still half inside the night. Specific names and places give the account a diaristic immediacy, but the real turn comes when the speaker cannot sleep and begins a 300-page memory project. The final recognition of an "American contemporary brain" turns a messy anecdote into self-diagnosis, as if excess, memory, media, and wandering all belong to the same national consciousness.

Claude

'From Four to Four in L.A.' logs a twelve-hour bender -- a smacked-up '1950 Plymouth / Named Empty Closet,' '26 approximent pints of Lancer's,' Eric Hoffer on TV -- that turns into '300 pages of memory' and a sight of 'My own American contemporary brain'.

The diaristic rush of place-names (Santa Monica Boat House, Freeway Fuller, the Venice 'midnight beach,' a gallon of Red Mountain 'in the mude in the waves') accumulates like talk from someone still half inside the night. The real subject is the writing instrument: alone at Conneely's 'wicker table,' the speaker begins a 300-page diary, gets 'interupted by a phone call / from El Paso' with Animal and Prankster 'Giggling at Bonnie and Clyde.' The closing recognition -- unable to sleep 'in the last American city,' he starts 'to see / My own American contemporary brain' -- converts the anecdote into self-diagnosis. Source spellings 'approximent,' 'mude,' and 'interupted' are kept as written.