Page 18
By Jack Joseph Smith
By Jack Joseph Smith
Original Scan
AI Interpretation
The speakers discuss need, taking things they know nothing about, pain and breathing. Later fragments mention forests, a lower avenue, marriage, children who have never been to church, and work.
The writer gives no speaker tags, so the remarks about hurt and forgetting cannot be assigned to separate people with confidence. The closing speaker makes staying depend on present feeling. Unread handwriting limits the connections between the exchanges.
A handwritten run of quoted exchanges: one voice asks 'Shouldn't you try to make / sure you need it,' the reply is that the speaker now has 'to start taking things / I know - nothing / about,' and later comes 'Damn. It hurts me so.' The page moves through 'To have it be done with / is a bitch!', a line that 'We never mentioned the / forests', talk of marriage and 'These kids / have never been to church,' and ends on 'If I didn't feel this way I would / not stay!'
The dialogue is clipped and unattributed, so pain, resignation and commitment arrive as overheard fragments rather than a scene. The closing conditional ties staying to present feeling, a note of reluctant loyalty. A few handwritten rows remain unreadable, so the connections between these beats are left open.