…walking, always walking , never, at least long time never, just running frantically down some stairs, pulling the keys out of his jeans on the fly, wrestling the front door open and jumping into the front seat of some souped-up, some Stewball Stu (from back in Olde Saco, podunk Maine days, king of the chicken runs and max daddy of the streets ever since he took out some Farmer Brown from Arundel overgrown son’s souped-up Dodge back in 1945) zen auto mechanic to the world, year old (broken in, see) 1949 Hudson, but always just walking down Larkin Street to the bay, ‘Frisco bay for the interested, to flush out his brain against the japan currents, against the pacific squalls, against the bay fogs, or whatever was against handy. This night his always walking was to figure out how much longer he was going to have to wait around for some shipping clerk’s job down at the dock at the other end of the Embarcadero to open up so he could make some dough, pay off Carol, Allen, and Bill and blow some dough with Stewball Stu on some lesser version of that dream Hudson and blow this old tired out ‘Frisco town.
As he walked toward womb bay he could just barely see the fogged-bemused dim spot Alcatraz search lights, eternal search lights against some phantom prison breaks like that search light, or that rock, was what held a man, any man, in thrall to his lesser instincts. He laughed as he saw a couple of kids, really just kids, maybe sixteen, no more, wobbly, walking across Bay Street, one with a bottle ready to be handed to the other, and from the look of it Tokay, the winos’ choice, and the “choice” of those too young to buy their own and hence some wino-snagged bought and that was what they got. As they veered off into their good night he thought, thought for just a minute about Sammy, Sid, Andre, and the Spider from back in his own old Tokay days in front river , front ocean Olde Saco a few years back, and some wino pete who go their Friday night booze from LaCroix’s Package Store in order to make them “rum brave,” girl-flirting rum brave, for the dance over at the Starlight Ballroom where, god, Benny, Benny Goodman was playing and he, that Benny-blessed night, had finally twisted old Sheila around his finger, if you knew what he meant.
As he walked some more down Larkin toward the chocolate smell of Beach he began taking that ancient thought out of his head as he passed the Red Fez for the ninety-ninth time (about ninety of them straight into the front door and low-shelf scotches and scored teas and, on occasion, bindles for the soul) since he hit ‘Frisco a couple of months back with some jack, a sweet girl, Lulu, all blonde, Iowa corn-fed and willing, and some idea that he would write the great American novel, a great American novel, or an American novel (depending on his mood), if he could just get his head in the right place, be in the right place, and have his freaking ‘Frisco golden-gate rust colored muse , his now completely fog-bound muse, working his corner. Nada, nothing, no go, got it. And then like something from out of some mid-1940s film noir movie where an unnamed band, unnamed until you read the credits to find out why you spent the rest of the film with that sound in your brain, fired up the night in the middle of the movie out of nowhere, he heard a sound, a high white note, blown pure by some unseen sex sax(not a Johnny Hodges, Duke’s’ boy Johnny , all fluffy around the edges pure, all satin and silk with a bow on it pure, mulatto pure, maybe black and tan pure , to keep the lid on for the paying customers, the paying white customers, the uptown mayfair swells out for weekly kicks, a little spindle tea to take the edge off, the cabaret café society crowd, a backing Billie swaying lilt crowd, who would freak out, who would call every variety of hell down on the player’s head, at what was played mex opium dream tea high back to proud earth mother Africa times after hours) now coming steamed, sweaty jungle-steamed, out toward the bay from deep within the Red Fez (blown, he knew from other nights, from other highs, blown deep in the bowels of the club up against the back bar by angel Cody Reed, black, black as a starless night, black who devoured negro and had not regrets, blasting safe, fashionable negro safe, blasting flash (wide-brimmed white fedora, open shirt, white lapel suit, midnight sunglasses) negro pimp walking daddy and pink Cadillac with one hip-hop note, blasting back to primordial black Africa mother homeland, blasting apart first, middle and last passages in a foreign land, blasting, cool as a cucumber, plantation miseries, plantation lashes, blasting too jim crow, get back in your place, brother , old ‘Frisco Mister James Crow.
A guy on the other corner, dark, brown, brown skin, brown hair, brown eyes, brown soul too, angel mex fellaheen (wearing a kind of out of fashion zoot suit looking a little frayed on the edges, maybe from L.A., maybe a little too much loco weed down south, maybe too some hard-ass bracero up-bringing, father and mother working sweated lettuce, or you name it, fields, and then back to some brown shack, and sixteen kids, jesus), maybe a flip, benny high, tea high more likely (but high, high from an expert eye high) was be-bopping words, night, fright, fight, bite, throwing out one after another trying, trying like hell, to match his palabras (some en espanol, some in English a tough task) with that high white note that he was chasing, finally catching some of it, some vicious moloch fight to blast words and notes, some shake the bracero dust off of himself in the fellaheen world that he was in his dreams fighting to break out of , making words slowly to match that floating note and passed . In the end he was not successful, reached for something in his pocket, threw it in his mouth and moved along Bay Street. Nice try brother but it will probably take some gringo fellaheen warrior, some street bandito from New Jack City, some fag kid from Hoboken or somewhere, yah, some fag kid with time on his hands to capture the words to the high white note. Meanwhile that note then floated down though the jazz-infiltrated streets pass wino jungles and wharf rough trade taverns to the bay and mixed and matched with the foam-flecked waves, the search light of the eternal rock, and his dreams. He had an idea…
… and hence Jeanbon Kerouac
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