Page 23

By Jack Joseph Smith

1. When Clifton Doolin walked down the steep stone stairs with our lady of Fatama he was all gaze across the cobble rectangular street eyes settling on that other courtyard. He could hear SWISH. That's all. SWISH... The lady was lanky and forehead bound. Olive smooth. With her a frown wasn't a prison. But they were locked up across the fence. No guilt here. No vision. Just idenity. For Clifton for now was just a child. SWISH... Singing. Tumbling the globe. The ball sank. Waited in its strings. Then fell. But then not to touch its other spinning earth. But to be grabbed. Swiftly. With no recognition. Only given to belonging. The doors slamed shut. Clifton looked over his shoulder. But his glance was to late. The wire screen and the one way glass that fortunately favored the inside caught in his face. And seeing back out for a moment Clifton could recall the Montasouri nun. For somehow still he felt her behavor. Not stilted. Just very tall. Reaching. Like a spring deep when watch- ing a big black bird flap. Off in the dream. There was a poem there. The cells that continue. Here at fourteen was a Jesuit athlete. The magic show was the best now called Sweetwater had ever seen. The curtain will surely come back. Vamped. No. That thick blood red; gone. Lived up. Laughing tooth in hand.

Original Scan

AI Interpretation

GPT

Clifton Doolin watches courtyard ball play with a lady of Fatama, then faces shut doors and remembers a nun. The writer identifies him as a Jesuit athlete at fourteen and ends with a magic show at Sweetwater.

The writer describes the ball sinking, waiting in its strings, and falling before someone grabs it. In the revised screen passage, Clifton sees back out for a moment and recalls the Montasouri nun. The writer replaces the cancelled age-and-murder sentence with a Jesuit athlete at fourteen; the transcription retains the supported revision order without explaining how the magic show follows.

Claude

Clifton Doolin walks down 'the steep stone stairs / with our lady of Fatama', hears only 'SWISH' as a ball 'sank. Waited in its strings' and was 'grabbed. Swiftly', then the doors slam and, catching himself in 'the one / way glass', he recalls 'the Montasouri nun'. A handwritten line replaces a canceled sentence with 'Here at fourteen was a / Jesuit athlete.', and a final paragraph turns to a magic show and 'That thick blood red; gone.'

The prose moves by short sensory fragments, 'No guilt here. No vision. Just idenity.', so the child's experience comes through sound, glass and memory rather than explanation. The handwritten revisions redirect the passage from a crime-tinged sentence toward Clifton's own image as a young athlete. Religious figures, confinement and play share the same frame without being reconciled.