PARTISAN REVIEW
415
in
my closet. I was afraid to cut my meat at lunch because I felt
like taking the knife and slitting my throat. The Doctor came by
while I was busy with the coat hanger. I didn't hear him coming
in or I would have stopped him from reading Melanie's poems,
which were lying on my bed. But it was too late.
"Daniel" he said. His voice was hard. There was no soul–
brother sound in it. Christ I was scared. But I didn't show it. I just
stood there with my back to him holding on to the grating. "Daniel.
You must forget about this fey
girl.
You and Melanie are
through."
I didn't know what to say. I didn't look around. I just nodded and
kept winding the hanger around. Finally the Doctor left. I looked
out through the grating across past the Hospital wall and the sea
beyond. The sky was dull and the San Francisco Bay was almost
grey. The waves heaved and fell like huge black tongues, and the
water rolled up like a monster's white eyes. The Bay was an awful
color. It looked polluted.
I'm glad the Doctor didn't stay. It's not that I feel like well
I'm not a man
if
I cry. But I just don't dig another man seeing
me cry, especially a Soul Brother.
May the sixteenth
I stayed up all night composing the letter to Melanie in my
head. I fell asleep for a moment and had a very quick dream that
I was in my mother's womb again and she was growing fatter and
fatter and just swelling up so much that she exploded and died
and I was pushed out into space where I melted into the black
sky and drowned. I wrote the letter to Melanie twice and then
I copied it onto hospital stationery that the orderly brought me.
I'll copy it over into you now, Journal, so I can remember what
I wrote.
Dear Melanie,
What you need is Freedom. Your poem Visions cries out for
Freedom. You must become your own master.
I love only God. I must dedicate my life to my People. God has
forbidden me to marry you. The angel's trumpet calls: "Daniel"–
and I must harken
to
its call.
Good-bye Melanie
Jet'
ai aime,
Daniel
