A Brief Literary Career for Bill Clark
1. An introduction.
A dentist friend of many years explains that friends are like teeth -- they help us to break down and digest nutrients for survival -- we need them to last a lifetime, but few will make it all the way. An hour after leaving with a new crown (“a false/positive friend”) I am at home filing dental receipts when I rediscover a manila envelope Miles had given me a long time ago. The contents include about three dozen poems, a couple of stories, abandoned lines, and one journal letter, written during a nine-month period, January - September 1978.
The past is a heavy anchor, an immovable link that sometimes prevents us from moving forward. In the case of Miles, I thought I had cut that link but then finding this package is a reminder that I haven’t traveled very far. I owe it to him, as will be explained later. There’s a good deed that needs to be done here.
The Miles that I remember had a sense of purpose and a conviction, a poetic persistence twenty-one years ago. To do this he lived in a world of words that he kept to himself. His once kind face became withdrawn and did not invite casual contact. Eventually, the isolation was self-destructive because all that’s left of Miles are these writings. It was a parting gift. Where he went and what he’s doing, I’m not sure I’ll ever know. People have to do all kinds of things in order to survive.
Rejection was a serious issue for Miles. Rejection is the most destructive force against the exuberance of creativity. After pouring out your best and that best is not acceptable, it's enough to send you over the edge. Maybe this is what happened. The closet has been his symbolic place of internment.
Emily Dickinson, the patron saint of the closet, was never published. Vincent Van Gogh, the great and wonderful muse of the neglected, was ignored in his lifetime. Poet/artist William Blake died poor and unknown. There are exceptional exceptions. Thousands of struggling, hopeful creators look to them for courage and solemn inspiration. I don't believe Miles wanted to be rooted in one backyard like Dickinson, neither would he have been inclined to cut off an ear in futile gesture like Van Gogh, nor would he have gone off the deep end with Blake-like visions. Miles took another road: he did his thing, and then vanished.
Perhaps the writing stopped because the process became insanely annoying. The constant searching for truths while living in a world of compromise lead to self-inflicted isolation – living on the edge -- is a sure way to fall into depression. Why waste yourself away like that?
Anyway, these pieces, these imprints that make up this Brief Literary Career of Miles Dowd, serve as an anthropological unearthing of the past. The attempt here is to try to put it into some kind of understandable form (a twelve step program) and help him in ways I couldn’t help before.
the edge
find
the edge between
ahead and behind,
the ledge of the shore
or the wedge of the door,
the lip of the cliff,
middle moments
like at dawn, at dusk,
to gauge both ways –
even truth
2. What I Remember About Miles
The majority of reality -- thoughts, dreams, creativity, love -- are not perceived by the casual eye. Things are not the way they seem. Facades have an esthetic value to be sure but there are other dimensions to life that in no way are perceived accurately no matter what job you identify with, what car you own, what food you eat or what clothes you wear. One may draw inferences from each but it still does not present the true depth of being a living entity.
With that in mind, on January 6, 1978, having hitchhiked across the country, a grungy Miles arrived at night in downtown Los Angeles. He was just in time to witness a movie scene being filmed near Union Station. Lights everywhere giving the illusion of brilliance, tech trucks, portable dressing rooms, and many people whose names might be mentioned at the end of a film were there. A small crowd of on-lookers had gathered, moths to the flame, Miles the moth included. After two hours a car sped on cue past a camera, then screamed down an alley. That was it. That was the real Hollywood.
There was talk that paid extras were needed the following day for some shooting inside the Shrine Theater. Paid to be in a movie. Could the journey have ended any easier?
A tired, optimistic Miles was pointed toward the Shrine and began weaving his way through the quiet downtown streets. After half a mile of ignoring crossing lights, suddenly, almost celestially, Miles was hit upon by a helicopter spotlight. Some film crew shooting. He decided to dance in the intimidating light as a humorous gesture. Miles, the undiscovered star.
The police cruiser that pulled up didn't see the humor. At 11:30 p.m., first day in town, he doesn't quite know where he is, or where he'll be staying yet, or the difference between a LAPD searchlight and a Paramount spotlight.
The police, on the lookout for someone else, gave him a jaywalking ticket instead of a movie contract. Wait til tomorrow... Miles thought.
Eventually he made his way to the Shrine Theater. He found a cheap hotel nearby where he could shower, shave and sleep briefly. Miles wanted to be extra early; to get paid to be in a film was like getting paid to dream. And he knew how to do that.
Just one good close up.
one close-up
if I could be
up there, projection
onto the big dream screen --
eyes bigger than windows
smile wider than doors
head larger than a house --
then will you see me as I've desired?
one close-up, that's all that's required.
only love or a camera create that scene
-- one bold moment of being
seen
Miles was one of the two-hundred extras in a scene for the Incredible Hulk. A piece of cake; a lick of the dream cream. One could make a good living being an extra, he thought. Extras vying for a particular spot in a scene, talking about connections, what films they've been in, waiting for that break, that discovery. But after thirteen hours of this, filming was not so exciting. Being an extra was not a good living. Like a crystal of sand lodged in the desert. No wonder they all wanted to be stars.
The way he told it, he left the Shrine feeling like a nobody, which was exactly what he was paid thirty-five dollars to be.
Twenty-four hours in Los Angeles. Miles had a run-in with the law, struggled with the Hulk, and survived extra nothingness. L A was an interesting place. Even if jaywalking was considered deviant behavior, a car would solve that. Everyone had a car. Even extras had extra cars like the battered '67 Comet he bought on the spot. The seventy-five dollar exchange also included directions to an inexpensive Armenian rooming house on Willowbrook, near City College.
The brief literary career of Miles Dowd was about to begin.
creativity
it must come out today
and kicks of unborn life
pound beat bulge
labor pains, professes
what goes in must come out
forward
3. Mt. Hollywood
A week later, unemployed and living frugally, Miles took a hike to the top of Mt. Hollywood. Located above the Griffith Park Observatory, the view offered a glimpse at the possibilities lurking across Los Angeles. He had found brief employment delivering phone books around the sprawling vastness below… from Bing Crosby's office on Sunset, to Dodger Stadium, to warehouses way out Firestone Boulevard. It seemed like a good way to make connections. He disconnected from that illusion after a couple of trips. The Comet would soon be cosmic debris.
On a bench near the peak, Miles met Bill Clark. Bill hadn't been feeling well lately and thought the hike to this peak might do some good. They talked about their individual problems. Miles’ account of the hitchhiking odyssey across the country, twenty-five rides in five long days, intrigued Bill Clark. Miles' plan was to establish residency for a year, then go to graduate school. His only goal in the meantime was to live a neo-bohemian artist-in-the-making existence.
Miles told of his new rooming-house mates, Lebanese refugees who introduced him to pita bread and tales of revenge experienced during the Lebanese civil unrest -- something about cutting off a body part of the captured and using it as a message and warning of reprisal. All roomers agreed L A was warm and pretty, like Lebanon, but had better opportunities, like being an extra for the Hulk or delivering phone books in lieu of body parts. Miles and the two middle-aged men shared a hotplate in the hall of the male-only rooming house and were subject to the constant vigilance of a rigid Armenian landlady. She was a cash-only spinster with unspoken tragedy encased on her face. She did not allow female visitations.
Miles reminded Bill of his younger self. Fellow loners. Bill, in his late forties, had established a good career as an independent graphic arts designer. But lately he felt a need to get away, at least for a few days. Maybe work stress was making him ill. Stressless, unemployed Miles agreed. They came to an agreement: Miles would housesit for Bill (and do a few chores) while Bill went to Mexico for a short vacation. A few days later Miles found a job working for a sheet music distributor, Preeman's on Spring Street in downtown Los Angeles. $2.65 per hour -- college graduate, Liberal Arts Degree. This is where we met.
Bill’s inclination to take time off proved to be sadly foreboding. His health became progressively worse. The unknown illness would send him in and out of the Hospital of the Good Samaritan over the next few weeks. With each changing diagnosis Miles changed his residence, from Willowbrook Avenue to Hollyridge Drive, from flatlands to the hills, from rooming-house to house with room.
Miles would begin to housesit regularly when Bill went to visit his family and ‘recuperate’ in Texas.
hidden Bill
in room 840 Bill's yellowed eyes float, bloated
with hope, drugged
I V veins, drips and drains. soundless
T V clawed to the corner ceiling
playing General Hospital. muted
love, life and death in private
drama. this is the real thing.
Hospital of the Good Samaritan
where my jaundiced friend awaits
where hepatitis is thought to be
where gallstones might reside
where a blockage and a cyst may be cancer hides
4. Miles’ Brief Life As A Would-Be Writer
Bill Clark left for Texas in early February not knowing he had terminal pancreatic cancer. The doctors, after consulting with the Clark family, had decided not to tell him. The hidden Bill. They also surmised that Miles was a good friend of Bill’s because Miles had visited after work every day. Hospital of the Good Samaritan. So they asked Miles to go along with the grave conspiracy. It’s better for his spirits. When Bill talked about his future it was full of life and health and recovery -- as soon as I kick this thing…
Virginia Woolf wrote that one must have a room of one's own and a little bit of money in order to write. Miles not only had a room but a house with a view. Bill's life almost seemed to be a sacrifice for Miles’ creativity. Miles often alluded to this and it gave him a focus and determination not to take it lightly. With the housesitting and a job, he could live far better than Woolf's prescription for success (he had a home, a view, and no bills). He packed his few flea market belongings with inspired anticipation and charged into the hills…with as soon as I kick this thing... echoing in the quiet house.
The Hollyridge Drive house was a stilted, one bedroom home with a view of Griffith Park Observatory and downtown L.A.. The street snaked along the crest of the ridge and ended on one of Griffith Parks’ upper fire trails. Across the street there was a view of the H O L L Y W O O D sign. Some eye-opening experience would come out of this situation.
Within a week, that’s what happened:
While attempting to clear the shrubs beneath the hillside home, Miles brought a hatchet down against some menacing, dried stems, but he slipped, lost his balance and his eye got gouged by a previously chopped-off spear. Nature could defend itself. Miles wasted valuable time contemplating whether or not to shave his going-to-be-distinguished writer’s beard. He did not want to be mistaken for a bum on top of not being able to pay for the emergency room treatment. He flushed his eye and went ahead and shaved, poorly, with one eye. The facial cuts he would blame on the shrub attack.
The Comet, restored by former Middle Eastern roommates, fizzled in the driveway with a battery only igniting frustration. Finally a neighbor was solicited for emergency transportation. On the way to the hospital the neighbor admitted, that he, Frank, and his mate, Tom, had been in over a hundred movies. You can make a good living as an extra. Miles admitted that he had tried it. Speaking of trying, by the way, he asked Miles flirtatiously, by the way -- do you and Bill like to share? Miles hadn’t realized Bill was gay. What?
The doctor explained the eye abrasion would take a long time to heal. An eye patch was needed for at least a week. Miles left County Hospital looking like a cycloptic vagrant / Lebanese refugee / naïve-Samaritan-would-be-writer. He sat waiting on a bus stop bench and strained his one good eye looking for a bus from 3:30 a.m. until 5:45 a.m.. Evidently buses had to get their sleep also. Dawn was scribbled on the back of his admission paper.
dawn
Sun rises, reddens, ripens
morning greens
grass plants trees,
waves of lavender leaves.
Air bursts with marmalade moisture.
Dawn’s buttery awnings spread.
A dog barks red.
Overhead a jet streams silently
vapor trails tails
white lines of a blue dome poem:
eye love hue
Bill phoned every few days. Their conversations were friendly, upbeat and open, except for the gargantuan lie. Bill’s cousin, sister, brother or sister-in-law would also call. It didn’t take perfect sight to see the conspiracy was fully intact and on track, held together by a mutual affection and the need to subvert unnecessary pain.
Dying lying. Maybe Bill knew but kept it in the same secret compartment as the gay issue. Maybe everyone knew everything.
excerpt from "The Brief Literary Career of Miles Dowd" © 1999 by John Kirkmire, © 2013 Kirkworkshop. All rights reserved.
return to stories page
1. An introduction.
A dentist friend of many years explains that friends are like teeth -- they help us to break down and digest nutrients for survival -- we need them to last a lifetime, but few will make it all the way. An hour after leaving with a new crown (“a false/positive friend”) I am at home filing dental receipts when I rediscover a manila envelope Miles had given me a long time ago. The contents include about three dozen poems, a couple of stories, abandoned lines, and one journal letter, written during a nine-month period, January - September 1978.
The past is a heavy anchor, an immovable link that sometimes prevents us from moving forward. In the case of Miles, I thought I had cut that link but then finding this package is a reminder that I haven’t traveled very far. I owe it to him, as will be explained later. There’s a good deed that needs to be done here.
The Miles that I remember had a sense of purpose and a conviction, a poetic persistence twenty-one years ago. To do this he lived in a world of words that he kept to himself. His once kind face became withdrawn and did not invite casual contact. Eventually, the isolation was self-destructive because all that’s left of Miles are these writings. It was a parting gift. Where he went and what he’s doing, I’m not sure I’ll ever know. People have to do all kinds of things in order to survive.
Rejection was a serious issue for Miles. Rejection is the most destructive force against the exuberance of creativity. After pouring out your best and that best is not acceptable, it's enough to send you over the edge. Maybe this is what happened. The closet has been his symbolic place of internment.
Emily Dickinson, the patron saint of the closet, was never published. Vincent Van Gogh, the great and wonderful muse of the neglected, was ignored in his lifetime. Poet/artist William Blake died poor and unknown. There are exceptional exceptions. Thousands of struggling, hopeful creators look to them for courage and solemn inspiration. I don't believe Miles wanted to be rooted in one backyard like Dickinson, neither would he have been inclined to cut off an ear in futile gesture like Van Gogh, nor would he have gone off the deep end with Blake-like visions. Miles took another road: he did his thing, and then vanished.
Perhaps the writing stopped because the process became insanely annoying. The constant searching for truths while living in a world of compromise lead to self-inflicted isolation – living on the edge -- is a sure way to fall into depression. Why waste yourself away like that?
Anyway, these pieces, these imprints that make up this Brief Literary Career of Miles Dowd, serve as an anthropological unearthing of the past. The attempt here is to try to put it into some kind of understandable form (a twelve step program) and help him in ways I couldn’t help before.
the edge
find
the edge between
ahead and behind,
the ledge of the shore
or the wedge of the door,
the lip of the cliff,
middle moments
like at dawn, at dusk,
to gauge both ways –
even truth
2. What I Remember About Miles
The majority of reality -- thoughts, dreams, creativity, love -- are not perceived by the casual eye. Things are not the way they seem. Facades have an esthetic value to be sure but there are other dimensions to life that in no way are perceived accurately no matter what job you identify with, what car you own, what food you eat or what clothes you wear. One may draw inferences from each but it still does not present the true depth of being a living entity.
With that in mind, on January 6, 1978, having hitchhiked across the country, a grungy Miles arrived at night in downtown Los Angeles. He was just in time to witness a movie scene being filmed near Union Station. Lights everywhere giving the illusion of brilliance, tech trucks, portable dressing rooms, and many people whose names might be mentioned at the end of a film were there. A small crowd of on-lookers had gathered, moths to the flame, Miles the moth included. After two hours a car sped on cue past a camera, then screamed down an alley. That was it. That was the real Hollywood.
There was talk that paid extras were needed the following day for some shooting inside the Shrine Theater. Paid to be in a movie. Could the journey have ended any easier?
A tired, optimistic Miles was pointed toward the Shrine and began weaving his way through the quiet downtown streets. After half a mile of ignoring crossing lights, suddenly, almost celestially, Miles was hit upon by a helicopter spotlight. Some film crew shooting. He decided to dance in the intimidating light as a humorous gesture. Miles, the undiscovered star.
The police cruiser that pulled up didn't see the humor. At 11:30 p.m., first day in town, he doesn't quite know where he is, or where he'll be staying yet, or the difference between a LAPD searchlight and a Paramount spotlight.
The police, on the lookout for someone else, gave him a jaywalking ticket instead of a movie contract. Wait til tomorrow... Miles thought.
Eventually he made his way to the Shrine Theater. He found a cheap hotel nearby where he could shower, shave and sleep briefly. Miles wanted to be extra early; to get paid to be in a film was like getting paid to dream. And he knew how to do that.
Just one good close up.
one close-up
if I could be
up there, projection
onto the big dream screen --
eyes bigger than windows
smile wider than doors
head larger than a house --
then will you see me as I've desired?
one close-up, that's all that's required.
only love or a camera create that scene
-- one bold moment of being
seen
Miles was one of the two-hundred extras in a scene for the Incredible Hulk. A piece of cake; a lick of the dream cream. One could make a good living being an extra, he thought. Extras vying for a particular spot in a scene, talking about connections, what films they've been in, waiting for that break, that discovery. But after thirteen hours of this, filming was not so exciting. Being an extra was not a good living. Like a crystal of sand lodged in the desert. No wonder they all wanted to be stars.
The way he told it, he left the Shrine feeling like a nobody, which was exactly what he was paid thirty-five dollars to be.
Twenty-four hours in Los Angeles. Miles had a run-in with the law, struggled with the Hulk, and survived extra nothingness. L A was an interesting place. Even if jaywalking was considered deviant behavior, a car would solve that. Everyone had a car. Even extras had extra cars like the battered '67 Comet he bought on the spot. The seventy-five dollar exchange also included directions to an inexpensive Armenian rooming house on Willowbrook, near City College.
The brief literary career of Miles Dowd was about to begin.
creativity
it must come out today
and kicks of unborn life
pound beat bulge
labor pains, professes
what goes in must come out
forward
3. Mt. Hollywood
A week later, unemployed and living frugally, Miles took a hike to the top of Mt. Hollywood. Located above the Griffith Park Observatory, the view offered a glimpse at the possibilities lurking across Los Angeles. He had found brief employment delivering phone books around the sprawling vastness below… from Bing Crosby's office on Sunset, to Dodger Stadium, to warehouses way out Firestone Boulevard. It seemed like a good way to make connections. He disconnected from that illusion after a couple of trips. The Comet would soon be cosmic debris.
On a bench near the peak, Miles met Bill Clark. Bill hadn't been feeling well lately and thought the hike to this peak might do some good. They talked about their individual problems. Miles’ account of the hitchhiking odyssey across the country, twenty-five rides in five long days, intrigued Bill Clark. Miles' plan was to establish residency for a year, then go to graduate school. His only goal in the meantime was to live a neo-bohemian artist-in-the-making existence.
Miles told of his new rooming-house mates, Lebanese refugees who introduced him to pita bread and tales of revenge experienced during the Lebanese civil unrest -- something about cutting off a body part of the captured and using it as a message and warning of reprisal. All roomers agreed L A was warm and pretty, like Lebanon, but had better opportunities, like being an extra for the Hulk or delivering phone books in lieu of body parts. Miles and the two middle-aged men shared a hotplate in the hall of the male-only rooming house and were subject to the constant vigilance of a rigid Armenian landlady. She was a cash-only spinster with unspoken tragedy encased on her face. She did not allow female visitations.
Miles reminded Bill of his younger self. Fellow loners. Bill, in his late forties, had established a good career as an independent graphic arts designer. But lately he felt a need to get away, at least for a few days. Maybe work stress was making him ill. Stressless, unemployed Miles agreed. They came to an agreement: Miles would housesit for Bill (and do a few chores) while Bill went to Mexico for a short vacation. A few days later Miles found a job working for a sheet music distributor, Preeman's on Spring Street in downtown Los Angeles. $2.65 per hour -- college graduate, Liberal Arts Degree. This is where we met.
Bill’s inclination to take time off proved to be sadly foreboding. His health became progressively worse. The unknown illness would send him in and out of the Hospital of the Good Samaritan over the next few weeks. With each changing diagnosis Miles changed his residence, from Willowbrook Avenue to Hollyridge Drive, from flatlands to the hills, from rooming-house to house with room.
Miles would begin to housesit regularly when Bill went to visit his family and ‘recuperate’ in Texas.
hidden Bill
in room 840 Bill's yellowed eyes float, bloated
with hope, drugged
I V veins, drips and drains. soundless
T V clawed to the corner ceiling
playing General Hospital. muted
love, life and death in private
drama. this is the real thing.
Hospital of the Good Samaritan
where my jaundiced friend awaits
where hepatitis is thought to be
where gallstones might reside
where a blockage and a cyst may be cancer hides
4. Miles’ Brief Life As A Would-Be Writer
Bill Clark left for Texas in early February not knowing he had terminal pancreatic cancer. The doctors, after consulting with the Clark family, had decided not to tell him. The hidden Bill. They also surmised that Miles was a good friend of Bill’s because Miles had visited after work every day. Hospital of the Good Samaritan. So they asked Miles to go along with the grave conspiracy. It’s better for his spirits. When Bill talked about his future it was full of life and health and recovery -- as soon as I kick this thing…
Virginia Woolf wrote that one must have a room of one's own and a little bit of money in order to write. Miles not only had a room but a house with a view. Bill's life almost seemed to be a sacrifice for Miles’ creativity. Miles often alluded to this and it gave him a focus and determination not to take it lightly. With the housesitting and a job, he could live far better than Woolf's prescription for success (he had a home, a view, and no bills). He packed his few flea market belongings with inspired anticipation and charged into the hills…with as soon as I kick this thing... echoing in the quiet house.
The Hollyridge Drive house was a stilted, one bedroom home with a view of Griffith Park Observatory and downtown L.A.. The street snaked along the crest of the ridge and ended on one of Griffith Parks’ upper fire trails. Across the street there was a view of the H O L L Y W O O D sign. Some eye-opening experience would come out of this situation.
Within a week, that’s what happened:
While attempting to clear the shrubs beneath the hillside home, Miles brought a hatchet down against some menacing, dried stems, but he slipped, lost his balance and his eye got gouged by a previously chopped-off spear. Nature could defend itself. Miles wasted valuable time contemplating whether or not to shave his going-to-be-distinguished writer’s beard. He did not want to be mistaken for a bum on top of not being able to pay for the emergency room treatment. He flushed his eye and went ahead and shaved, poorly, with one eye. The facial cuts he would blame on the shrub attack.
The Comet, restored by former Middle Eastern roommates, fizzled in the driveway with a battery only igniting frustration. Finally a neighbor was solicited for emergency transportation. On the way to the hospital the neighbor admitted, that he, Frank, and his mate, Tom, had been in over a hundred movies. You can make a good living as an extra. Miles admitted that he had tried it. Speaking of trying, by the way, he asked Miles flirtatiously, by the way -- do you and Bill like to share? Miles hadn’t realized Bill was gay. What?
The doctor explained the eye abrasion would take a long time to heal. An eye patch was needed for at least a week. Miles left County Hospital looking like a cycloptic vagrant / Lebanese refugee / naïve-Samaritan-would-be-writer. He sat waiting on a bus stop bench and strained his one good eye looking for a bus from 3:30 a.m. until 5:45 a.m.. Evidently buses had to get their sleep also. Dawn was scribbled on the back of his admission paper.
dawn
Sun rises, reddens, ripens
morning greens
grass plants trees,
waves of lavender leaves.
Air bursts with marmalade moisture.
Dawn’s buttery awnings spread.
A dog barks red.
Overhead a jet streams silently
vapor trails tails
white lines of a blue dome poem:
eye love hue
Bill phoned every few days. Their conversations were friendly, upbeat and open, except for the gargantuan lie. Bill’s cousin, sister, brother or sister-in-law would also call. It didn’t take perfect sight to see the conspiracy was fully intact and on track, held together by a mutual affection and the need to subvert unnecessary pain.
Dying lying. Maybe Bill knew but kept it in the same secret compartment as the gay issue. Maybe everyone knew everything.
excerpt from "The Brief Literary Career of Miles Dowd" © 1999 by John Kirkmire, © 2013 Kirkworkshop. All rights reserved.
return to stories page