Page 157
By Jack Joseph Smith
Coward
What is there to know
Hanging out in a tough
neighborhood
when you are on probation
Let me know
when you come up
with something else
that is any differant
Cause that is what
I've got
Original Scan
AI Interpretation
GPT
"Coward" strips toughness down to probation, a hard neighborhood, and the speaker’s refusal to pretend there is any more noble explanation than that.
The poem is short because it has no patience for ornament or excuse. It answers the title by refusing performance: this is what life has given, and the speaker dares anyone to produce a cleaner version of it. That bluntness makes the page feel less like surrender than a challenge.
Claude
Coward reprise of page 64's probation short: hanging out in a tough neighborhood, daring a different answer.