3320. THE PHILIP GUSTON BRIDGE

THE PHILIP GUSTON BRIDGE

nyc, (1967)

I called back once, and he was gone.

All that color and content, patiently 

waiting for him, or myself, to come.

The ceaselessly stupid old phone rang

crankily off its hook  -  no one ever

answered; just as no one ever sang or

warbled, or hummed. A hangman in a 

hood, that fat cigar, and the cracked 

and mottled shoe : loathsome intimations

of how rank this single humanity can be.

-

I shook his hand and tapped his back,

numerous times and long ago, on Eighth

Street and on Tenth. We hung together

like compadres  -  the crazy Rover 2000,

the car he drove to and fro, and his wry

smile  -  over and over  -  about something

quaint or another. Back and forth to talk.

-

Morty Feldman. The Woodstock studio,

Milton Resnick and David Hare. Jesus

Christ, I'd give an arm to have it all again.