Page 57

By Jack Joseph Smith

The Slightest Thought If and when power is there, and I don't even know what that is, but I know It's funny Imagine me being a baby to thee While also I am too sick to intercourse thee No one leaves the road, once your on it; we all know that The silence you hear about, insidethe stones of old books All the same like child and flag Of course not I knew all of this, but I can't remember Life is perfect with the loss of the mind Stilts and tightropes, clowns and gatherings Shyness as the bitter part of war, one to another; suddenly your frame is a giant, with nothing to do

Original Scan

AI Interpretation

GPT

Power, sickness, war, silence, and old books are held together by a comic-strange voice that keeps enlarging and destabilizing the self.

The page moves from power and uncertainty into bodily sickness, road, silence, books, war, and scale. Its comedy is uneasy: the speaker knows and forgets at once, then suddenly becomes framed as giant and useless.

Claude

In 'The Slightest Thought' the speaker admits he does not know what power is 'but I know It's funny', pictures himself as 'a baby to thee' yet 'too sick to intercourse thee', and gathers odd images: 'The silence you hear about, / insidethe stones of old books', 'Stilts and tightropes, clowns and gatherings'. It ends with 'suddenly your frame is a giant, / with nothing to do'.

The poem is a string of loosely joined assertions whose confidence keeps undoing itself: 'I knew all of this, but I can't remember' sits next to 'Life is perfect with the loss of the mind'. Circus images and war share the same flat, deadpan register, and the closing giant with nothing to do turns sudden size into comic uselessness.