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59 lefcowitz Barbara F. Lefcowitz Memoirs Of An Amnesiac A woman who had suffered a nearly total loss of memory was found wandering in a park near Fort Lauderdale, Florida. . . Even after widely televised publicity led to a reunion with her family, she claimed that she was so fond of the court-assigned name Jane Doe she would keep it as her own. - The Washington Post 4/81 Tm the goddess of lost baggage. Pure jazz. Your dream that swam off with the bait. Down a ramp into black water each day's tightly roped sack carries me off. Tve forgotten why I can't remember who I am where I was what I'm for. Hello, I'm Jane Doe. Has anyone a story to spare — a twist of hair, worn music, a jolly old aunt? My family of mirrors is friendly but ceremonious. Always I must flash a calling card. Hello, Tm Jane Doe. Today I'm your valentine girl, decked out on a spray of black lace. Today your marzipan bride. Do not try to reclaim your silver and jewels; my fingerprints vary like snow-crystals. Cameras are shy. How I must embarrass their wide stupid eyes. I'm the blur in the back row, the jagged streak that cuts the name from the face behind you. 60 the minnesota review 111. My curriculum is tough but timely: COMPARATIVE LINGUISTICS: the verb to be in Dance, Wind, Snake, The Shapes of Smoke. MUSICOLOGY: the Gavotte in B flat for Roof and Rain. GEOGRAPHY: how to get from X to Y via burned bridges, obliterated paths, duplicities, mendacities. HOME ECONOMICS: the art of spring cleaning when you have no closets, jars, boxes, tins. iv. "Though all my actions are bent on erasing the consequences of my previous actions. . . I must bear in mind that every move to erase previous events provokes a rain of new events. . . which I will then, in their turn, have to erase." — Italo Calvino The truth: I cannot lie. All of my lies are lies. The art of lying is intimately connected with the art of remembering. The art of remembering is intimately connected with the art of printmaking. My fingerprints, you may recall, vary like snow-crystals. Hello, I'm Jane Doe, the super-monolinguist, untranslatable as a pun. My only nostalgia is for the present. vi. When all your disguises curl up, 3 a.m. or that little crook in a conversation, the words stumbling back to their corners sweaty and slightly bruised, grateful for a gulp of gatorade, you can visit me your ad-hoc committee of one, your star performer, the girl that you keep in your attic so the circus won't get her. Hello, I'm Jane Doe. 61 lefcowitz Vil. Throw out the dried flowers, old summers glinting in jam jars, all the keys and lockets. I burst through the morning's egg onto your breakfast tray. Lost baggage. Jazz. The dream that swam off with the bait. ...

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