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RIP-TVRIP-TVRIP-TVRIP-TV
RIP-TVRIP-TVRIP-TVRIP-TV
RIP-TVRIP-TVRIP-TVRIP-TV
2001-06-26
Judy Garland (b. Frances Gumm)
B. 6.10.22 Grand Rapids, Michigan / D. 6.22.69 London
Drug Overdose
I am in a motorboat with no one I recognize, rushing at full speed out to sea. A captain-type is declaiming to the passengers at large about how few will ever have the nerve to sit up front�so dared, I move to the prow. We�re cutting at a 60� angle from shore into the blue-black Atlantic; heavy storm clouds nuzzle the horizon. Being jounced over waves through wind and spray with no land in sight is so exhilarating, I whoop. Suddenly I�m alone in a small rubber raft and decide it�s time to head back. When I turn the craft, Boston Harbor�s blue skyline appears unexpectedly tiny, etched against a stormy, slate-blue dusk. I�ll really have to paddle�but in the inch or so of water which surrounds me in the bottom of the raft (which appears to be deflating) there�s no paddle to be found, because I�ve forgotten to bring one in all the excitement of that fast ride out. I�ll have to use my hands�but the distance, the waves�I probably won�t make it, I'll never make it. This conclusion scares me so much I wake up, into another dream; a brief intermission for coaching (What am I, a coward? What�s the worst that can happen�it�s a dream!) before I send myself back to the raft to await whatever happens. Upon my return, however, I am suspended in the water, the raft is floating overhead, and I realize I didn�t make it after all. A bigger boat�s wake must have swamped me. So flipping the raft away like a trapdoor I poke my head out of the sea and spy an impossibly large yellow moon peeking at me from the nearby shore through the painted towers of a cardboard Lower Broadway, while Judy Garland�s film recording of �Somewhere Over the Rainbow� accompanies and slowly fills the scene. Alone�alas!�I cry and cry, because I was alone; I cry myself awake into another intermission, from which I�m sent to Staten Island where I�m walking by a beach while someone behind me says to a friend (we�ve all come over together on the Ferry), Just watch her, see how they can pick each other out in a crowd, watch the eyes.