Page 13

By Jack Joseph Smith

The grass we found just as birds together going to tips of trees Was away in a wagon stuffed like grain with bodies of fellows quite furrowed with rolling mostly with what concerns the universe We didn't attempt to figure it out Cause we had bigger stuff to do Listen, water was so precious, but Denny Phillips never asked for a drink And that graveyard many times fell final to the hit over the fence in softball But we were tougher than an acorn Down under the limestone denny Philips and me were involved with worlds of men subtracting nature in drills of confrontation Denny laughed, always lauged; he seemed to know the exposior I took it serious and formed a gang Maybe it would become riggt not to be with Denny Phili-s in his death Maybe me weakness is a respect for sex But then one should refolutionary be ably to cross over though twenty years be blind behind them

Original Scan

AI Interpretation

GPT

The Denny Phillips remembrance continues through shared games, scarce water, confrontation, laughter, a gang, and the friend's death.

Denny laughs while the speaker takes things seriously and forms a gang. The final lines ask whether the speaker can move beyond that loyalty with twenty years behind him, without resolving the question.

Claude

The Denny Phillips remembrance continues with 'a wagon stuffed like grain / with bodies of fellows', water 'so precious' though 'Denny Phillips never asked for a drink', and boys 'tougher than an acorn'. Denny 'always lauged' and 'seemed to know the exposior', while the speaker 'took it serious and formed a gang' and weighs whether it 'would become riggt not to be with / Denny Phili-s in his death'.

The page sets Denny's ease against the speaker's seriousness and the confession 'Maybe me weakness is a respect for sex', turning boyhood games into a reckoning with loyalty and survival. The typed draft keeps its slips and invented spellings, which leave the closing wish to 'cross over though twenty years be blind behind them' rough and unresolved.