Page 36

By Jack Joseph Smith

married. Oh. Now Michael, you look nice. Except we need some shoes. Would you like to wear the shoes Grandmother Frost sent you for Christmas. They are very good shoes though, and you must take care of them. Mom, hows come its so dark now, when it was so sunny this morning? Things change Michael, and the weather is no exception. Now put your shoes on, and you can wear this jacket from Grandmother Faolain. I wish they were here to see you. The house became a non idenified shifting of a many faced carnival, but there was no mystery in their eyes. The women smiling like false eyelashed children. And the man balancing the martini glass on his grownup head. No matter to me and I went dancing through the dining room and around the high backed chairs and into the kitchen smelling and seeing all kinds of strange things like burbon glasses being filled with cherries and oranges and the toasting to the turkey in the pan with its bare legs sticking up in the air. I would run going through their different worlds appearing and disappearing; and they would greet me as I came and Michael would be my name as I answered all their quest ions for them. They were like flash cards runing above my eyes, while I moved beneath them in my own underworld. I could see in their stretching faces fill ed with straining laughter that they all wanted to be happier than they were, no matter how happy that might be. The laughter was not real, because they did not belong there, together. The only thing they knew about each other was that they were begining to be the silent wealthy that nobody ever hears about, because their place was to be executives and not dictators; that they might

Original Scan

Page 36

AI Interpretation

GPT

Once the child is dressed and fitted with Christmas shoes and jacket, the house fills with holiday guests who look festive but hollow, and the adult laughter begins to feel like a performance of rising wealth.

Michael runs beneath the guests' faces and compares their questions to flash cards above his eyes. He notices their straining laughter and thinks they want more happiness than they have. He calls them the silent wealthy and describes their future as executives.

Claude

Dressed in shoes from Grandmother Frost and a jacket from Grandmother Faolain, Michael joins a holiday party where the house becomes 'a non idenified shifting of a many faced carnival', with women 'smiling like false eyelashed children' and a man balancing a martini glass on his head. He darts among the guests, answering their questions, and sees in their straining laughter people who 'were begining to be the silent wealthy that nobody ever hears about'.

The child moves 'in my own underworld' beneath the adults, and that low vantage lets him see the strain behind their celebration. The carnival and flash-card images make the guests seem interchangeable and performed, their laughter 'not real' because 'they did not belong there, together.' The page turns a festive scene into a sharp, early reading of class aspiration and loneliness.