STAIRS
THOSE AREN’T CLOUDS THEY’RE STAIRS
He remained innocent +teeming with desire
He later saw the captain who had given them
orders layind dead, a half-naked body with a
bare chest and dark, swollen woman’s nipples.
After WWII he vowed never to be afraid of
anything again Bonfires of words being lit all
over America Great man of letters died June 25
90 collapsed at his gym in elegant Sag Harbour
Born James Horowitz Died James Salter
He was the purest form of himself 3 word sentences
Some 2 Some more The daughter was a soft, seductive
color, six or seven years old. He was holding her by the
waist, half woman, half vase. Like Sylvia Plath James
believed in magic until the age of 9
Both had seen sharks wash up in their grandmother’s
gardens after hurricanes There was a two-headed toad
in my own Bubbie’s garden +I squashed it with wild
abandon Sylvia a suicide +mother of a suicide James
father of 5
__
There comes a time when you realize that everything is
a dream, and only those things preserved in writing have
any possibility of being real. James Salter 2013
Summer 2015
