Bildungsroman (Spare American)

151 DANNIEL SCHOONEBEEK BILDUNGSROMAN (SPARE AMERICAN) Sunburned as he was and salt in his beard and fucked he stood here south street the edge of the sea Counting the breakers off liberty island he’s dying for it his licorice and whiskey A family the father in seersucker the child in seersucker they wave to him from the ferry they throw their coins in the water they pass in front of the statue nobody asks about mother Ist sommer? Sommer war. —Paul Celan 152 He stood here he counted his earnings (nineteen seventy nineteen years old and nobody’s father it was the year of the hard hat riot on the steps of city hall year he cut his beard and begs to help hammer in the window of the world’s tallest building) where today I stood with the world’s poorest woman her hair like the hay in the town my father discovered when he saw it was time 153 to refuse to keep painting and fucking and die Sunstruck as I am and shorn and the world’s poorest woman beside me will we marry will we family two thousand nine thirty-nine years after my father threw down his wage swears he must quit his job or his whiskey and keep painting and fucking or die Is it summer if the lawmen come on horseback and the seagulls tear up his money forgiven by only itself will the old sea buckle ...