4376. ALL OF MY CARGO WENT DOWN WITH THE SHIP

ALL OF MY CARGO WENT

DOWN WITH THE SHIP

'A workingman; I'll be a sonofabitch. Listen here, kid...

I ain't worked in seventeen years.' The train came in,

the engine stood hissing. Marc took the rails to San

Francisco. The Titanic left Southampton on April 10th.

I felt like velvet was leaving my skin : everything out,

nothing in. The moonscape American sky never faltered

back then. 'I was a magistrate in my own domain.

Light me a match then, brother, leave me the candle

to find my way out. These creeps have playing the

same chamber music anyway for three years now -

still can't get it right. What land is this? What land

is this now anyway? No place I ever seen before.'

-

I felt fat but I was skinny like a rail. I never felt hunger

like this before - no money, and everything else going

dark. Dark like some darkie homin' it on home. 'Swing

low, sweet chariot, comin' for to carry me home.' I had

heard that just the other night in a darktown minstrel

show. Why do they have to play in blackface when

they's already black enough? 'One day, one day

John and the boys, they came back after work with

a projector and some films - on that big white warehouse

wall, they was playin' pornographic films all night long.'

-

'Ooh wee! I swears. 'Never seen nothing like that before!'