Page 38

By Jack Joseph Smith

The abiss at the end of civilization She (the older sister) stood with her baby in her arms on the old North Side Bridge. Steel rivited, iron forged curves buldged by rust. At the middle. At the edge; while she (the younger sister) watched. From a distance the younger had followed. And now stood stopped. At what was the AlleganY's beginning, and ending, for Manchester's deposseesed. By realistate they had been shifted off their homes on the Hill Dis- trict, "and it wasn't pretty down here on the riv- er." But the baseball stadium would go up soon, "or at least during the next year or two," and that would bring space during their move to the next hole. Night and Allegany. Under Pittsburgh light. Red and blue. Dancing the colors of oil down the water. A whistle and a paddle wheel pushing coal. The barge the river men want to leave, thinking, (outloud not outlawed) "I'll close my mind forever to it at the push of the tavern door."

Original Scan

AI Interpretation

GPT

An older sister holds a baby on a North Side bridge while her younger sister watches. The writer places their scene beside Pittsburgh displacement, stadium construction, river work, and tavern speech.

The bridge's rust and the oil colors on the water surround the sisters with an industrial city. The account of people moved from their homes gives a public context to the older sister's position at the edge.

Claude

Under the title 'The abiss at the end of civilization', an older sister stands 'with her baby in her / arms on the old North Side Bridge' while her younger sister, who had followed, watches from a distance at 'the AlleganY's beginning, and ending, / for Manchester's deposseesed'. The prose then tells of families 'shifted off their homes on the Hill Dis- / trict' by 'realistate' as a baseball stadium goes up, and ends on the night river and river men who will 'close my mind forever / to it at the push of the tavern door.'

The draft sets a private moment on a rusted bridge against public displacement in Pittsburgh, and fragment sentences like 'At the middle. At the edge' build tension without yet saying what will happen. The handwritten paragraph and run-in marks show the author still shaping the prose.