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gudlyf · 4 years

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The Saddle [Short Story]

(Edited photo by Josh Puetz)

Why do I continue to abuse myself so?

I’m back at the NYC Midnight Short Story competition again. You know the drill: genre, location, object, 2500 words, 1 week. That’s the first round, at least. This time I’ve got: Crime Caper / A reunion / A police officer. At first glance, a bit too simple. Everyone’s gonna do the class reunion gone bad, or a family reunion with someone out to steal Grammy’s jewels. Trust me: you need to steer far, FAR away from such tropes. The judges will get sick of them, and yours won’t stand out, never mind a chance in hell.

The good news about having “crime caper” as a “genre” is that it’s not so cut and dry as “drama” or “comedy” – you can pretty much do whatever the hell you want, so long as you’ve got a planned crime involved. Comedy, drama, horror – it all works!

I had a few ideas in mind, but they were a bit too … cutesy? In the end, I decided I’d make the best of the levity and make the story work out for me, even if it doesn’t cart me forward in the contest: throw in some horror, of course. Later, without the 2500-word restriction, I can tighten and lengthen it, then slip it into my planned anthology perfectly. Works for me!

Something I want to note about my writing, that I’m pretty clear on: I tend to get wordy and deter from “the point” quite a bit. Ramble, maybe? I’m not sure yet if that’s a fault of mine or just an acquired reading style. Stephen King: he rambles. At least I think he does. He’s successful. Is it because he’s earned the right to ramble and so gets a pass? I know I’m no Stephen King but … OK I’m rambling. On to the story.

—

Courage is being scared to death, but saddling up anyway.

It was something Shawn used to say to Ruth when she was too scared or shy to do something she wanted – rather, needed to do. She’s pretty sure he got the saying from someone famous, but the man loved horses, so she thought it a fitting phrase for him to latch onto. And she still thinks of it when she’s too chicken shit to do what she wants to do; what she needs to do.

Sometimes courage has nothing to do with it at all. Sometimes it’s flat-out self-preservation; common sense. And when those situations face you square on, you may as well take that cowboy saying and toss it right in the toilet, because no manner of courage makes up for being stupid.

Ruth had barely a recollection of how she got there, squatting below the beam of Rack’s flashlight, picking at a mausoleum keyhole, thinking of Shawn. She hated Rack for bringing her there, but he was at least good at finding jobs worth paying a damn in that godforsaken armpit of the world. Worth paying for Shawn’s medical bills that a cop’s salary couldn’t touch. She’d have seen to Rack sporting orange duds at Hillsborough County, or among the many laying prone just inside, if he wasn’t at least good for that.

She winced as something flared within her brain, then stood, smacking her head on Rack’s flashlight.

“Shit! Why’d you pick this place?” she asked, rubbing her head. “This place.”

Rack threw his hands up. “You picked it, remember? Said ‘something-something Ambrose’ … A big score. Biggest yet. Wouldn’t say nothing else. Maybe you could, y'know, clue me in yourself?”

She shook her head. “No. No, I … How can I not remember that?”

“You better remember. We need this one. Damn place gives me the creeps. How much longer?”

“I dunno. Few more minutes. Now shut up.”

The lock was popped five minutes ago, but Rack didn’t know that. Ruth knelt once again and resumed picking at a keyhole that had already relented, like one would a toothpick digging at a stubborn gobbet. She wasn’t ready to go in.

Saddle-on up, Ruthie.

“Right. Saddle-up,” she whispered.

She supposed having courage had about as much to do with it as stupidity after all. The fact that she still wore her uniform on jobs like these pointed her actions firmly toward the latter camp, but it helped serve as a cover story more than once.

The iron door opened without a sound into the darkness, into the cold, into only where death lay.

“Yesss. Alright, ladies first.”

“No. Go ahead.”

Rack shrugged, lifted the toolbox, and shone his flashlight into the gloom.

“Whatever you say. Officer.”

She hated that Rack felt the need to say that. She could sense his wise-ass smirk as he stepped through the open doorway, as though what lay beyond was nothing at all. It was so easy for him to treat it as just another job, when the clothes he was wearing didn’t serve as a contradiction to the task at-hand. Her uniform was all part of the plan: she knew that. Always had been. It didn’t make it feel any less violating.

“Good to be working with you again, Cassidy,” Rack said. “Remember our last job? Shit, must’ve been a year now since-”

Since the last time I was here, she thought. Saying goodbye.

“Yeah, something like that.”

Rack shrugged off the interruption and continued into the cold air of the mausoleum. Ruth followed close behind, her own flashlight lit. The scent of flowers for the dead stung her senses and rattled her already pounding head as she shut the door, echoing off the marble floor and placarded tombs. There was a feeling of finality, of no turning back. If only the proverbial horse she’d saddled onto would carry her forward.

“Jesus this place is big,” Rack said, spinning around. “Must be a thousand of 'em.”

“Twelve-hundred,” she said.

“Really? Damn.” He shone his flashlight along the marble vaults, its beam catching nameplates as it went. “Alright, so … where is he?”

“Section 8C, row 28. Second from the bottom.” It came to her unhindered, automatic.

She’d last been there so long ago, yet recalled Shawn’s resting place like one would a friend’s phone number. Or a husband’s. She tried to shake the thought away.

Rack flinched, fazed. “You remember it just like that?”

Her head continued to shake. “No. Forget it. Someone else.”

Ruth turned her eyes to her left, toward Section 8C, where along row 28 and two doors up from the floor was a name plate she was sure she’d never cast eyes upon again. Yet there she was, mere footsteps away. And for what? Still, she wasn’t sure, and Rack’s patience with her would no doubt grow thin at the prospect of her not knowing.

“So. Lead the way,” said Rack, with a flourish of his hand.

She scanned the names outside the tombs around her, stacked four high, floor-to-ceiling. Some were clearly older than others: their name plates more tarnished; vases empty of flowers, or containing skeletal, leafless stems. Those more recent had flowers in varying states of decay, or with trinkets and mementos placed at the foot of their stack: notes, toys, more flowers.

Shawn had a plastic Appaloosa under his, she recalled. She had left it, then, before walking away for what should have been forever.

“Hey Cassidy,” Rack said.

The pain in Ruth’s skull surged as she snapped out of her thought.

“What do you call these things we’re looking at, on the graves? The things the names are on. Doors?”

“They’re tombs. Graves are outside, in the ground.”

“I think they’re, like, seals or something. Can’t call 'em doors, right? Ain’t like anyone’s opening them all the time, y'know? 'Cept us I guess.”

“Yeah. Well. Some doors are meant to stay shut.”

“Not tonight they ain’t. Not all of 'em.”

What kind of job was it, really? Parting the overly wealthy, the exceedingly fortunate of their over-abundances seemed an entirely different sort of job than relieving the dead of precious items left to rot alongside them. But was it so different? Were they not merely indulgences left to waste? Perhaps a more honorable thing was to see them do some good in the world than have them forever sealed away? Perhaps, she thought, that was reasoning enough to get her to find this “job,” as loose as that term was for it. It still didn’t put a veil over what kind of place it was, nor who took residence there.

If not Shawn, who was she looking for? She may have had a hand in putting some of the bodies there over the years, but names tended to wither away like the petals littering the floor. She chose to keep those names locked away in the mausoleum of her mind, with doors that are forever closed. Closed, perhaps, but apparently not sealed, with an occasional issuance that served to drive her mad.

“C'mon, Cassidy, which one?” Rack’s tone bordered on annoyed. “Just blurt it out. Come on. First name that pops in your head. Tick-tock, tick-tock! Go!”

Shawn. No!

“The blacksmith’s son,” she said, though not knowing why. “The blacksmith’s son. That’s all I got.”

“What? Blacksmith’s son? That’s not a name. That ain’t gonna be on the front of any of these doors.”

Ruth stepped forward, reading nameplates as she went.

“Maybe you’re wrong,” she said. “There’s more than just names and dates on these.”

“Yeah, alright. But 'blacksmith’s son’? I dunno. Don’t you have a name? Just need a name. C'mon, think. That’s what you cops do.”

What did he think she’d been doing the moment they’d arrived? And before that? And what did come before? She presumed a car ride, a phone call. All of that lost now, and none of it made sense.

“How did I tell you about this job?” she asked.

“What do you mean 'how?’ You called me, remember?”

“No. What did I say? I didn’t tell you a name or anything then?”

“Naw, you just said it was in Saint Ambrose’s and it was enough of a score we’d be set for life.”

Rack averted Ruth’s gaze. He suddenly didn’t look so good. Her cop’s intuition fired.

What are you not telling me? she wanted to say, but was stopped short as Rack’s flashlight flickered out.

Ruth turned her own light toward Rack, but he had disappeared as fast as his light had gone dark.

“Rack?”

Her flashlight sputtered out.

THUD! THUD! THUD!

The hairs on her neck and back sprung lives of their own, standing at shaky attention beneath her uniform. The pulse within her brain beat in rhythm to the reverberating sounds around her. She fought the urge to double-over in pain as her hand flew to her sidearm.

“Rack?!”

THUD! THUD!

The sound of a match being struck, then a soft glow from her left.

“Hey,” a male voice said.

She threw the latch off her weapon and drew it, wheeling about. It was not Rack.

The man stood twenty feet from Ruth at the center of the hallway. Along with the cigarette that hung sideways from his lips, the stained-glass-colored moonlight barely illuminated the contours of his pale face in the dark. He was young, well-dressed and, despite his submission with one hand raised, unafraid.

“I’m a cop,” she said. “Who the hell are you? What are you doing in here? Put your other hand up!”

Slowly, he complied.

“I know who you are, Officer Cassidy. Thought you’d be happy to see me.”

Her pistol remained drawn and ready, safety released. There was nothing good about someone lurking in the dark of a place like that, no matter their business or intentions. She resisted the urge to call out to Rack again. She could explain a uniformed cop’s presence just about anywhere, but not with her slime-ball partner-in-crime in tow.

“How the hell should I know who you are?” she asked. “I can barely see you.”

He remained still, with only the movement of slender tendrils of smoke rising from his silhouette. An occasional auburn glow from a cigarette inhale gave hint to the bemused smile that held it. Something about it became at once somewhat familiar to Ruth, but only just.

“You work here?” she asked.

A drawn-out exhale. “Something like that, Ruthie.”

A realization struck her, and she did all she could to stifle a cry.

“Sh-Shawn?” Ruth whispered.

At that, the man began lowering his hands.

“Keep your hands up!” Ruth yelled. “Wh-What the hell is going on? Who the fuck are you?”

“Ruthie,” the voice said with calm reassurance. “Ruthie, it’s me.”

Ruth released the dead flashlight, letting it clatter to the floor, as she drew the now freed-up hand to steady the first. Her finger teased the safety on her pistol as she fought back tears.

“Shut up! My husband is dead! Shawn is dead! What kind of sick fuck are you, calling yourself Shawn, huh? Who are you?!”

The man dropped the cigarette, then took a careful step forward, into a shaft of moonlight that illuminated his face in full. Ruth’s tears released.

“Hey honey. Good to see you again.”

Through a watery veil Ruth saw that before her was indeed Shawn, just as she’d last seen him. It did nothing to make her lower her weapon; as much as such a vision brought her joy, innate intuition kept her in check.

“No,” she said, shaking her head in disbelief. “No no no.”

Shawn sighed. “I know. Sorry to drop in on you this way.”

THUD!

Again, to Ruth’s right. Again, her head. She snapped-to and spun around, her gun now pointed in the direction of the sound.

“Rack?!” she called out.

“Rack’s gone, Ruthie,” said Shawn. “It’s just you and me right now. He’s not coming back.”

“What do you mean 'right now?’ Who else is coming? My dad?!”

Shawn chuckled nervously. “No, not your dad.”

THUD!

“What the fuck is that?” she said. “What’s going on?”

Shawn stepped closer. Ruth kept her gun pointed down the dark hallway, where what sounded like imminent threats lay. The man before her – the person who had to be Shawn, but couldn’t be – was no threat in that place. As her tears continued their descent, Shawn gently placed his hands on her shoulders.

“Ruthie. You have to remember now.”

THUD!

Ruth jumped, her nerves shot. The sound was louder now, closer, more threatening.

“This is crazy. I must be going crazy. I-I-I don’t know what you mean. Remember what?”

“Shhh. You’re not crazy. The name, Ruthie. The one you came for. It’s important.”

THUD! THUD!

Shawn turned Ruth to face him and put his hand on her wrist. She complied as he slowly helped her lower her gun.

“It’s time to saddle-up, Ruthie. You said a blacksmith’s son. Do you mean 'son of’ a blacksmith? An Irish name, maybe? Like 'Mc’-something? You can do this.”

Her eyes widened and the flow of tears ceased, while a calmness began to wash over her. She realized then what she’d missed most about not having Shawn in her life: his reassurance that she could do no wrong, even when that was all she felt she ever did.

He also had a way of giving her a nudge when she needed it most.

“MacGowan.”

Ruth’s world slowed as she dropped her gun and let herself fall into her husband’s arms. He held her there, saying nothing.

She still had no idea why she was there, how Shawn was there, or why such a name was so important and so difficult to muster. All she cared for then was the unlikely reunion. To feel for once safe, and with a mind finally at peace.

Retired Officer Ruth Cassidy remained sedated and restrained in the dirty laboratory bed, an array of sensors covering her wounded head. Doctor Roland hobbled over with his cane once again to the set of monitors, still displaying the computer-generated interior of the Saint Ambrose mausoleum.

THUMP! THUMP!

He cast a glance over at the woman in bed, with puddles of sweat and tears soaking the sheets by her face.

He turned the monitors off, retrieved a phone from beside them, and typed out a call.

“It’s Roland. I finally got that name for you. 'MacGowan.’ Yes, right. Yes, glad we didn’t have to resort to, well, more dangerous means. She’s lucky. A woman in her mental state, the brain damage … she might not have survived the next phase.

"Strange thing: it worked even when your avatar malfunctioned and blipped out of the simulation. The names in there didn’t seem to matter. She just sort-of told the name to … well, nobody. Just out of the blue.

"Anyway, payment’s due tomorrow. Hope you find what you’re looking for, Mr. Racksmith.”

#horror #nyc midnight #crime caper #short story

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l0-f1g0dd3ss3s · 7 years

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1977 interview with patti smith

concentrating on the god within[from "Patti Smith Peaking: The Infinite Possibilities of a Woman," by Marc Stevens and Diana Clapton, Club Quest, January 1977]

She hurtles into the room, a breathless tousled angel with a face out of Edvard Munch. She carries with her the karmic electricity of the genuine superstar, the true heroine. Her energy is so untrammeled, it fills the room; it pushes us against the wall in its intensity. Those wondrous salamander eyes move slowly, almost supernaturally. They embrace the whole of the activity around her. Her Mary Janes, her 4th grade red sox, the fine, strange jewelry lashed to her writs. The arching, artist's fingers, almost too much purity and reality and talent. Things become improbable. She is gracious, considerate, the essence of feminine charm, all the mannerisms of the sexually self-confident woman, the emotional largesse of the truly arrivée. There must be something bad about Patti Smith. Well, she doesn't play the guitar that well -- yet. She has the eerie beauty she treasures in those old Italian or French films, the mantle of mystery of the steadily evolving female unafraid to declare herself a fully sexual individual. She speaks of her own erotic feelings with candor and honesty. Whoever said that rock was really sex with all the rhythms down -- certainly had Patti in the wildest corner of his mind. Patti: It's either not hectic at all or it's totally hectic. It's like the ocean, y'know, a big, big wave comes in.. I just tune it in. It starts out, there's a lot of static, like the radio, and you go like this [twists imaginary knobs] and it comes in. That's like the ocean -- not so bad. I don't care if there's a lot of action going on as long as I can tune it in.

CQ: You were supposed to be out at the ocean this weekend -- on Fire Island.

Patti: Oh, yeah, but I had too much work to do. Cutting the new album took about 3 weeks, but the cover and the liner notes...

CQ: The record [Radio Ethiopia] seems a lot more lyrical than Horses.

Patti: It's got a lot more presence. We've been on the road for a year. The first record really reflected exactly what we knew then. Being alone by ourselves, fantasizing, playing in small clubs, the fragile adoration of the people who believe in ya. But then you go on the road for a year and it's real maniac. There aren't 40 people who love you but 4,000. You have to really project. You can't be as fragile. It's the power of projection that you learn on the road. So the new record reflects what we learned from the kids. Before I was a fan, an artist, or whatever. If I'm a fan of anybody these days, I'm a fan of my audiences.

CQ: But 4,000 people means performing in large halls. Can you handle it?

Patti: I like performing anywhere there's a lot of energy. Like Jesus says, when two people are gathered together in my name. Well, I feel the same way. I like performing in an interview situation or for 4,000 people or in a club. As long as all the energy is directed toward the same place. When I perform some place and the people have their heads into what they want to see, like something artistic, it's a drag. But when they're loose...

CQ: How loose do they get at your concerts?

Patti: Real loose. Jumpin' up on stage and grabbin' me -- everything.

CQ: Do you get bothered?

Patti: I like it. It's rock 'n' roll. If nobody leapt on the stage and cried 'Fuck me' ... I mean, I've seen Privilege; I'd do it. In the old days, especially when I'd go to a concert -- Johnny Winter, the Stones or Hendrix, I'd scream and get beat up and try to get on the stage. I got stomped by Grateful Dead guys for try'na get on the stage when they were on. And my foot got broken with the Stones.

CQ: How about violence directed toward you personally?

Patti: Oh sure, I've been attacked. After the show the kids come back, but I understand it, y'know? It's not that I want it to happen, but when it does, I get into it. I can dig it. It's a nightmare, but a nightmare I can relate to. I know what it's about. I've seen those Elvis Presley movies where the girls were try'na pull his clothes off. Hey, I know what rock 'n' roll is all about. I came into this thing with my eyes open. I didn't come in thinking that people should treat me like some precious jewel because I write poetry. I came in fully open to anything rock 'n' roll has to offer.

CQ: Do you get stage fright?

Patti: Nah, real excited. I only get nervous if it's real quiet out there. That makes me suspicious. But if the kids are screamin' and carryin' on, I get real excited. I was so thrilled when I did the Schaefer Music Festival in Central Park, I thought my heart was gonna burst.

CQ: Do your fans give you expensive gifts -- say, a half ounce of cocaine?

Patti: I've had ounces. And grass. But one time a guy sent me a letter. His name was Timothy -- no number or last name or nothin' -- and two $50 bills in it. Brand new, and I couldn't give 'em back. Free money.

CQ: Have you changed since you began making it?

Patti: I feel stronger. I feel like I've been doin' it all my life. It's still art, and I been doin' art since I was 4 years old. Rock 'n' roll has now entered the art spectrum. And because of that, I put the same energies into working within the context of rock 'n' roll as I did when I wanted to be a sculptor.

CQ: You mentioned that you've been on the road here and abroad. Does travel inspire you to create art?

Patti: O yeah, I been to Paris about 10 times. To get inspiration I got to a bunch of places -- to Jim Morrison's grave in Pere Lachaise, that's the first place I go. In fact, our first European tour was really cool because they had this white Aston- Martin or somethin' waitin' for me. You know, I don't get treated that way in America. In America I'm lucky if I get a station wagon. I'm just sayin' that I happened to be treated like a princess in Paris. So anyway, I had this white car and they said, where do you wanna go? And I said, to see Jim Morrison. So they took me to the graveyard in the big white car. I remember the first time I went, I was all by myself in the pouring rain. Really fucked up and the mud was splattering all over me. I was in this white car smoking a cigarette.

CQ: Just you and the chauffeur.

Patti: Yeah, me and him and a pair of dark glasses and a pack of cigarettes.

CQ: Do you smoke a lot?

Patti: I don't inhale so it doesn't hurt my lungs. I just like the look. really on top of it, I like that Jeanne Moreau woman-with-her-cigarette look. It's all for show. My own show.

CQ: White cars, chauffeurs -- is power important to you?

Patti: Power? Not like dictatorial power. Power to initiate change, to affect people in a really spiraling way. To be a catalyst. Just like when I worked at Scribner's book store for 5 years. A kid would come in and want Rod McKuen stuff. To me power was bein' able to talk to that kid, and he'd leave with Malderer, Rimbaud, Dylan Thomas. Now I feel I'm doin' the same kinda thing.

CQ: It was about this time that Robert Mapplethorpe gave you your start -- paid for that first book of poetry.

Patti: No, he didn't give me the start that way. He did lend me the money for my single. But he did much more than that. I was 19 years old, really shattered. I'd been through a lot of hard times. I had all this powerful energy, and I didn't know how to direct it. Robert really disciplined me to direct all my mania -- all my telepathic energy -- into art. Concentrating on the God within, or at least a creative demon. I was really emotionally fucked up.

CQ: Are you evened out now?

Patti: Oh yeah, I mean, I go through pain, but I try to translate everything into work. I'm almost 30 and I've been through so much stuff. Every time I go through something new, I have so much scar tissue that I suffer pain, but it doesn't take me so long to get back on my feet. I can get back on top real fast. I'm in the ring! Y'know when you're an artist an' you're like, strugglin', nobody cares. You get beat down; you stay down for a while. But when you're in the middle of the ring, you gotta get up fast because there's all these people watchin'. You don't have time. You know technology is 50% of rock 'n' roll -- the magic, the art, the performance. If you don't have good technicians and a strong road crew who are devoted and believe in you and protect you, you're totally naked.

CQ: But the spotlight's really on you. You're the one who has to deliver.

Patti: But it's what helps a performer stay on top, like a boxer with his trainer there. You have to know that these people are behind you. Then, when you really start to break and it's happening, a whole new kind of energy is created around you. And if you're smart, it'll make you a stronger person.

CQ: But other rock stars had the technology going for them but couldn't channel the break into a new kind of energy.

Patti: I was lucky. I've never been real fucked up on drugs. I knew Janis real well. She was so fragile, so emotional, a lot like, say, my mother. I mean we're all emotional. But you can't let your emotions consume you. If you can't transcend that emotion, into work, then you can't do anything. I'm real emotional. I mean if I'm really fucked up and cryin' sittin' in a room . . .

CQ: And drugs and booze only make it worse.

Patti: I use drugs to work. I never use them to escape or for pleasure. I use people. If I'm real depressed, I have some real wonderful friends. When you turn to drugs, all you're doing is turning inside, anyway. When I'm in trouble or emotionally fucked up, I don't wanna come to me. I wanna go to somebody else. I don't wanna look in a mirror. I only use drugs for construction. It's like one of my architectural tools now. I don't go to a party and get all fucked up. Or sit in a hotel room all sad and messed up and take drugs.

CQ: But enough rock stars did use drugs as an escape. Now they're dead.

Patti: I'm not makin' a platform about it. I'm just sayin' for me, personally, I think drugs are sacred and should be used for work. That's what I believe in. Drugs have a real shamanistic value. I can handle drugs. I've never had a problem.

CQ: Some New York discos are getting pretty loose in terms of drug tolerance. Have you noticed?

Patti: I can't go. I'm a great dancer, I love to dance, but when I go to discotheques, people talk to me so much that I can't. It's like Edith Piaf. She was very religious but she didn't go to church, because everybody looked at her.

CQ: Judy Garland couldn't eat in a restaurant for the same reason. But are you that bothered?

Patti: Oh, I eat like an animal. I come from a big family. I'm used to bein' watched. Here's what I don't like: If I'm in a certain mood and I feel pissed off or crazy and I exude that, I want people to understand it. The only times I get pissed off are when I'm walkin' down the street and someone wants to talk. I say, "Look, just trust me. I'm fucked up now; I can't talk to you. I need you. Thank you believing in me but..." And when they keep right on botherin' me, I say finally, "Look -- I don't need ya. Go away. You don't understand. Don't buy my records!"

CQ: Do you think about equality for yourself?

Patti: No, I don't wanna be equal with anybody. I wanna be above equal. I don't think most people are equal to me. I'd like to communicate with everybody; I'd like to do something universal, I'd like to have the hit record of the world. But that's not the same as being equal. Women compete with women; it's not all men. When I was sellin' books at Scribner's there were stupid women that were older than me, and they got paid more just 'cause they were older. You can go on forever with that shit. So you fight. I don't think fighting is bad. People get too much of what they want and they loose the fight in them.

CQ: Should you always keep battling to be the best?

Patti: Being on top is not the precedent. It's that I am capable of making it to the top of the tower. Why should I settle for the 26th Floor? I don't set limitations.

CQ: You seem very free as if limitations are beside the point. You seem unencumbered by race, color, creed, gender. The 100% natural Patti Smith, no additives, no preservative, no makeup.

Patti: Oh listen, I buy Vogue. The other night I was really depressed and got into a taxi and went to a newsstand and bought, like, this $10 magazine of Paris fashions. Fantastic photography. I love silk raincoats, but I don't wear makeup. I can't stand nothin' on my face. It's a phobia. It's not a platform.

CQ: Do you like leather?

Patti: Oh yeah, sometimes. It depends on the rhythm of the night. I'm like a changeling. Fickle. I might wear all leather, and then I might wear a fucked up little black dress. Plus I got a lot of cool T-shirts.

CQ: How do you feel about your body?

Patti: I'm an artist. I'm not ashamed of my body. I've been an artist's model for years, and people have been photographing my body nude since I was 16. I have no shame. Doing rock 'n' roll, I'm so naked now.

CQ: Do you ornament yourself as a sex object, the way other women might spend hours before a mirror?

Patti: Well, I'm a very sexual person. Pornography, eroticism -- that's what I work on in private. None of that has been published yet. I'm still workin' on it. Rock 'n' roll is the most important thing right now. Pornography has yet to see its day -- really high class pornography. But it's something I think about all the time. Pornography linked with elegance and grace and intelligence.

CQ: But pornography as art is entirely a personal choice, completely individual. What form of expression would you take in creating erotic art?

Patti: I feel I'm involved in it right now, at least as much as I know how, on stage. I've been accused of everything including masturbation. And I do come on stage. Almost every night, I come on stage. Sex -- coming -- is about concentration. I can come while I'm writing, if I'm really there. Orgasm is peaking your concentration.

CQ: Is that an end for you? Do you work consciously for that?

Patti: Well, any woman is capable of multiple orgasms. What I mean is, a woman can come all day. Women don't realize how heavy this is. When I first realized what coming meant -- that I could come 20 times if I could come once, over and over again like the ocean...even self-induced...I'm not necessarily talkin' about sex now.

CQ: But even now, there are objections to your lyrics.

Patti: My single My Generation / Gloria says "My Generation contains language which might be objectionable." To who? 'Fuck' and 'shit' are American slang.

CQ: But you can get away with it on stage.

Patti: Yeah, but remember Jim Morrison was locked up for using 'fuck' and so was Country Joe. And Jim pulled his pants down -- so what? Now we have Broadway shows where the cast is naked all the time. He did it once and was thrown in the slammer. And he was a genius. His death made me sadder than anyone's. He wasn't done. He was just on the threshold of being a really great poet. Now, Hendrix, he was so out there with such furious physical energy, he just died. Morrison was much sadder. He was also desperate. Rock 'n' roll was so new then. It was so heavy. There was no precedent for Jim Morrison. it's a lot different for me. I've profited from the fact that he came first.

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#patti smith

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