AMELIA EARHART, excerpts from a work-in-progress

"I believe it was the winter of 1918 that I first became 
interested in airplanes."             Amelia & I breakfast at 
the 10th Ave Diner        18th street          She's having 
sunnysides up        & I'm just coffee      no sugar.     We're 
talking about the           lakes of Minnesota        where we 
both spent many summers.         I explain my theory        of how 
her love for flying              comes from         being from          the 
Midwest.       I myself get claustrophobic              if I can't see 
for five or six miles in all 4 directions                     I say.         She 
agrees         As far as the eye    Wheat                      is all 
we hear      rough beards rasping                     land & air 
Unrolled.         the plains 
                           People like us        want it back       she tells me 
We want to flatten everything around us            Always Clearing 
Clearing        Pushing       making space          We want acre upon 
acre     upon acre        the plains . . . . . . . . the flat runway before us 
the song of the engine       the terrible velocity           & then 
the space      it's the moment inbetween        the thing 
at the end of it all           what we are always after       that Flat 
that lucid        that unstopped        Opening!       the Space . . . . . . 

"Assholes!"       her eyes seem grey in this soup      the hangers 
chalk        & grey         sound of the engines grey     & far off           I 
craved those fogged-in afternoons        just the two of us         getting 
high       &       hanging out          We'd work on the Electra           some 
have a beer or two          then share our last joint          under the fuselage 
&       shoot the breeze         the reward for marriage is getting a 
man's name          we decided       Mrs Donald     Roscoe Jr.     Mrs 
Kenneth Norton the III           Vowing the next      time we ran     into 
Ginger        & Tootie         on the street      we'd hail them       as       Don! 
& Ken!              the old levitation trick                   first anger crushes 
then leaves you         light as air        arm          squashed into doorjam 
step out        & up it goes            Finally we'd laugh til we were sick 
guffawing        out of control       going spaz      in the spilled beer&
oil           hugging          pawing each other wildly          we'd laugh til 
we sloshed     tumbling in spilt motor oil                  spazing out      we'd 
laugh til we were sick      pouring the rest of the beer               in 
each other's hair        hugging & sloshing in spilled motor oil-- 
We always.        wore      khakis & boots.         & if I smoked         I'd 
tuck my deck        in my rolled     t shirt sleeve       the way poets 
do       or stash a homemade behind my ear like in the films 
While           AE'd stand out there                   in     visibility      zero 
Hooting        the long letters of her name          A M E L I A . . . . . . . 
E A R H A R T . . . . . . . . 
                                     aviator           aviator           aviator

     It's about space                     & claustrophobia                AE 
born in Atchison Kansas              me I'm Minnesota We 
were passing time       at the opening                Doping on the 
works        "Who is this creep!"          Her arrogance made me 
horny         & woozie at the same time        standing on one 
foot        the way she often does            Dark gabardine 
blousy pants          her shirts were always oversized    the 
leather flying jacket looked authentic                 but sometimes I 
think she never combed her hair            her lips were always 
swollen         with wind & sun          they reminded me 
                     of      trees     their great swollen arches 
drawing . . . . . . then closing behind you        You're like 
your plane             I started         I had to talk            to keep talking 
so she'd stay        she hated crowds     I put my fingers on her 
wrist        I was terrified it was over between us         I couldn't 
get my breath            it's about space             she began 

Halfway through Pennsylvania          I start to relax       & by the 
time we hit Illinois        I just feel happy          Nothing has 
changed in my life      but I'm happy          I feel so good    then 
into Iowa the weight is gone        just lifted that's all I feel 
like a girl again       waving my arms     Once I jumped from 
the car       ran alongside                ditch grass stinging my 
thighs       legs flying       my arms outstretched so my shadow 
resembled a plane 
                   there's this weight      on my chest         & now it's just 
Gone     completely gone!          I'm airy as feathers 
       half the world is sky        it's just everywhere      you 
won't see sky        like that           except out there 
                                                                         I find 
trees amazing          & terrible           AE said . . . . . . 

If a huge letter M     had been constructed in the gallery 
it could have been remarked that while Amelia & I occupied 
an area at the acute angle in the upper left where leg met 
center line        Mabel Boll could be found chatting three quarters 
of the way down the right leg         twirling a swizzle stick in 
scotch & soda    light reflected off her in all directions 
Bathed herself in jewelry     Queen of Diamonds 
                              under the powder a slight sunburn could be 
detected            her bucket was the Columbia 
she planned       to beat Amelia        across the Atlantic 

The quarters a pilot works in           four feet eight

inches high       four feet six inches wide           four feet 
six inches        fore & aft
 

I took 48 feet of heat tape        four packs of four 3 foot 
lengths of insulation          a flashlight           a trouble light a 
roll of duct tape           a scissors               & a radio to keep track 
of the space shuttle.             Left radio & insulation at stooping 
height                 Left trouble light .              & extra heat tape at crawling 
height              Took duct tape      scissors     & enough heat tape     Slip 
ping      slithering on my back           a miniature dust storm      rotating 
thick dirt             eyes & nose filling with sediment           the body 
stiff            caught between     element       & element          Arriving beside 
the tiny cold copper piping            but unable to move even my head 
side to side      or lift an arm

klos tro fo bi a, N. (fr. L. calustrum, a confined place + 
phobia.)      Med. Morbid dread of being in closed rooms or narrow 
places.                                             the Italian film                   where 
Ulysses is thrown into a heavy stone prison      then ever so slowly 
the ceiling begins to descend         first he is forced to stoop 
then to crawl          then finally to flatten himself on the floor 
& push         at the last second he is saved by Jason   But 
the experience has left him a       raving lunatic 
 
Don't cough       storming more dust into the small stratosphere 
all fingers feeling less            in numbing mercuries 
 
first woman to cross the Atlantic by plane 
first woman to fly the Atlantic alone 
first person to solo between Hawaii & California

her horizon        & her instruments 

At breakfast the question of nuclear weapons in space 
 
Now      the voices were faded      they sang to her       Her own 
name     in bits            Underneath 2556 miles of water whistled 
shore     tunes            its soft clapping a comfort            & a horror 
The plane is the point at which the fog & the sea would meet. 
A koan is a puzzle that cannot be answered in ordinary ways. 
All my 
          Electrons Lord!        all my protons       neutrons    leptons 
     mesons        baryons      all my Gravitons!         this will be 
the secret of my disappearance          A massless particle 
is a particle      of zero rest mass all of its energy         is energy

                                                                     of motion 
 
 
 
 
O geography          My Great Flat Home 
 
the corpse      floated        a strange shaped emerald 
under the sea