May 2, 1978 - Excerpt From Journal

From Mar 6, 2020 reedited today

Am I a poet?
Some people think so
Not many
But most everyone else consider poets hopeless wastrels
Today, tomorrow, yesterday
Losers
Throughout time
Poets have suffered
Living off scorn, hatred, ridicule, apathy, love, and poverty___

Hart Crane wrote THE BRIDGE
A brilliant poem

How many dawns, chill from his rippling rest
The seagull’s wings shall dip and pivot him,
Shedding white rings of tumult, building high
Over the chained bay waters Liberty—

Sailors threw him off a ship In the middle of the Caribbean___

Edgar Allen Poe
A mystery death
Last words
"Lord, help my poor soul"__

Lord Byron struck down by fever
Fighting the Ottoman Empire
To Free Greece

"Friendship is Love without his wings!
Now hatred is by far the longest pleasure;
men love in haste but they detest at leisure.
The great art of life is sensation,
to feel that we exist, even in pain__

And Joyce Kilmer was slaughtered
Along with millions of his generation
In the trenches of France__

None of them sought death
Death just happened
Despite the magic of cadenced words and syllables
Languages molded far from the public__
Now few people recite poetry
And even fewer hear it spoken
I recite my poems to the walls
Of my small room
In a seedy SRO hotel
My drunken neighbor bangs on the wall
"Shut up already."
These three words cast their spell
I go silent___
The only poets making money are singers
I can't sing
So I work as a waiter
As the Rolling Stones sang
"It's the singer, not the song."__

LATER

I played softball with the crew from EST. My position was right field. No one hit in my direction. Ann took over pitching in the fourth frame. I hit a triple in the fifth and our side had a one run lead. She kept them off the bases. In the last inning a young actor from Kansas hit a ball sharply. Ann raised her glove too late. The ball struck her face.

She spun around, as if she had been shot, holding her head. I ran from right field. Her theater friends clustered around Ann. They stood shocked by her pain. I kneeled and held her right hand. Her left hand covered that side of her face, which was red from the impact.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," stammered the young actor."

"It's not your fault," answered Ann and the studio director, Kurt Dempster, asked, "Do you want to go to a hospital. Maybe your nose is broken."

That was the last thing any actress wants to hear and I said, "It looks fine to me, Ann. Breathe deeply."

After a minute Ann stood up. "I'm okay."

She sat out the final outs and I sat by her side.

After the game we went downtown to my place. My drunk neighbor was playing on his sax. I asked Ann if it bothered her.

"No, I like Coltrane. Will I have a black eye?"

"No, but if you do, it will be cute."

LATER

Why am I content with poverty?

I haven't had a ten-spot in my pocket for days. My Irish grandfather and namesake would leave the house with less than $500 and that was in the 40s. I wish I was the same, instead I'm a pseudo-intellectual beggar.

After our fight about Anthony accusing me of stealing money, she said to him, "Peter wouldn't steal. If he wanted money, he'd get it from me."

I do love her.

In the meanwhile I'm waiting for my tax return check. I'm getting thinner and thinner. Marc Stevens asked if I wanted to deal cocaine. I said no. I tried dealing in Boston and only ended up deeper in debt. Right now I owe everyone money. I see no solution other than work. I tried to get a taxi job. I needed $75 to get the licenses. Nothing is free.

Ann is in love me with, but fears dependency on me. She'll probably leave for her own good. I wish I could do the same. Sadly I'm stuck with me.

Summer is getting closer.

Last year in Brooklyn was a disaster.

This summer is looking to be a repeat.

Damn. Damn. Damn.

That's the best poem I've written this year.

December 11, 1978 - East Village - Journal Entry

Last week slipped out of existence without any resistance to the daily grind of waking past noon, Alice embracing me until three, Her going to Irving Plaza, while I wandered the East Village until six, having a drink in a Polish dive, then return to 256 East Street to watch TV, sleep and repeat. An unhealthy rut, but tonight was the first meeting of the National Resurgence Party at the downstair bar in Irving Plaza. I was surprised by the turn-out; Kim and the Kyle, Lang, Joseph Curtin, Mombo, Grant, Alice, Mitchell, John Kemp, the British shoemaker, and Jim Fouratt, Who fought at Stonewall, who's more interest in having sex with me than my humorous take on American politics.

After Stanley, the manager brought us a round of drink, I announced that the NRP will officially launch in the New Year with a meeting on the Staten Island Ferry to propose the occupation of Greenland, whose premise is a joke since the USA has no interest in world domination after the Vietnam Debacle other than to capitalism in the USSR through the sale of Coca-Cola.

Yesterday Metro-Novelties went well at Irving Plaza, even though David McDermott narcissistic madman routine of a Stock Broker losing his mind after the Stock Market crash of 1929. Not that he was a jumper. David heroically had helped rescue Patti Astors's husband after he fell of Tom Sculley's roof, but he has been replaced as emcee by the Mumps Kristin Hoffman, who is so funny and musically talented.

Klaus Nomi was the headliner and his popularity has spread beyond the gay demi-monde. We remain friends, but one day and one day soon he will be a star and stars have little time to space of light bulbs like myself. "Lady Bug' Hickman performed he erotic acrobatic routine and I wondered what it would be like to have sex with such a flexible female. Alice and I haven't touched each other in weeks.

Her rat-thin witchy friend Susan glares at me as if I were fucking her cat. She really is a cunt, but thankfully I have nothing to do with such a soul ugly harridan. Lance Loud lovingly covered the Sex Pistols'ANARCHY IN THE UK, then anonymous yet profane version of THE NUN Story followed by the ever popular Businessmen in Space. They are so Devo.

Kim Davis shared the stage with her partner ripping off grafitti tee-shirt after tee shirt, who looking like the illegitimate Jewish son of General MacArthur, complete with sweep-over. Traci Sherman deep-throated fire, accompanied by scantily dressed go-go girls in punk leather. Some egomaniac declared himself THE CENTER OF THE UNIVERSE. I wanted to throw him off state and suggest so to Alice. Her girlfriend Susan sighed with man-hating ennui, so I shouted the Center of the Universe, "Fuck you.You suck. Someone should have killed with at birth."

Susan gasped and I realized she was fucking this loser unbeknownst to her boyfriend, Tom, but then she's not the only one who hates me. Donna Destri still holds a grudge as my fight with with Blondie and I say to John Kemp, "Fuck her. She has legs like horse and tits as flat as pancakes. Alice and Susan walked away from he and John said, "Don't worry about them. All Susan thinks about if fucking Alice."

"Thanks for the comforting works."

In truth I was a little jealous, as the trio of Alice, Tom Scully and fucking Susan have successfully introduced vaudeville to the East Village and the modern world. They are stars of now, but I never wanted to be them and in truth I'm happy not to be them either. I remain faithfully a no one.

Thanksgiving 1978 From My Journal

Thanksgiving 1978 was spent at our Easts Village apartment; Alice, Kim, Bobbie, Andy Reese, and Grant. I ended up dropping LSD with Bill Yusk. The first hit was weak and I dropped another tab. Still nothing coming on and I drank wine with Alice and Kim.

Two hours later I was drunk and the LSD hit hard. Cooking the turkey was very spacey and the bird spoke to me several times. Bill laughed and Ann asked, "What's so funny?"

"A talking turkey."

"A talking turkey, a talking turkey, a talking turkey."

I saw everything in triplicate. Ann wasn't even high and ordered Bill and me to get more wine. We left laughing and wandered to the Bowery with the street reflecting a shimmering glow.

We passed two women sitting on the curb. Dykes. Both were dressed in black and both were gnawing on turkey legs. Bill and I laughed at them, then the short one called my name. I didn't know the big one, but the small dyke was Gilly, a waitress at Dojos. Their wild eyes emanated yellow.

It was an LSD Thanksgiving for them too.

"You want turkey?"

"Talking turkey."

Bill lost it and I tried to get him away, but he wanted to feast on turkey bones and I returned to 256 East Street. Everyone was gone, except for Kim and Alice, who asked, "Are you okay?"

"I have wine and I have you two."

Kim shook her head and asked, "Where's Bill?"

"He's chomping on a turkey bone on the Bowery with two hippie dykes." I didn't want to rat out Gilly. Alice was very jealous and Kim said, "I hate hippies."

"You hate me?" I asked Alice.

"Not you. Only hippies."

"Well, Happy Thanksgiving to them all."

"And us too."

The trip last into the evening and I came down on the couch, as Alice and Kim watched a Fred Astaire and Ginger Rodgers movie.

It was very funny.

Especially how Ginger danced backwards.

"Talking turkey."

Acid came onto the scene in the 1960s. I was too young for it then, plus I was only into pharmaceuticals, dexies and 'ludes.

In 1971 I hitchhiked up to Montreal to visit friends from New Zealand. I bought a horse choker capsule from a midget dealer.

"Is it any good?"

Tres bonne."

I split it with Brian Alwinkle and his girlfriend, Chris Bilkensapp.

It was very strong and the universe vanished into a webbed mystery.

Forever indeed.

October 10, 1978 - Journal Entry - East Village

One NRP member incurred the wrath of the Party by suggesting that we kill the rich. I agreed with Guadalcanal in theory, but everyone else rejected violence.

"If we use violence, we will be just like them," Anthony Scibelli said parroting the old movie line foisted on the film's audience to prevent the poor from ravaging the Upper East Side or Greenwich. It isn't like Anthony is square, but I don't trust him, especially since he hit on Alice at CBGBs.

Later at our apartment Alice said that she wanted the NRP to handle security for New Wave Vaudeville.

"We can't pay anything."

People put their lives on the life, they get paid," I countered, although all of the male members are tough as one twenty-five year-old from the South Shore.

"None of them are asking for money. Why are you backing them? I'll pay you. Just don't tell anyone."

"I only want John Kemp to get paid." The British shoemaker was a good friend.

"Just John."

"And not Anthony."

"Certainly not Anthony.

On some things Alice and I agreed completely.

"I don't think we will be able to pull off the show. Everyone is fighting for the limelight, except Klaus." She was mostly talking about Susan Hannaford, who thinks she is a genius. I can't stand her, but have never told Alice that. The Hillbilly ingenue was on the verge of tears. I held her in my arms and told her everything was going to be alright. I hoped it wasn't a lie.

Mark Mandrell is in Thailand. He quarantined two weeks in a Phuket hotel. I want to go so badly, but my finances are desperate, since I can't really work in my condition. Heavy labor seems to be the only things that comes my way. Old Yellah can't seem to get it in her head that I am sick. Not so sick that I can't walk or lift things, but I need my rest.

Nothing like sleep and even more than sleep with my family in Sri Racha and Ban Nok.

May 5, 1978 - Journal Entry

Kim, her sister Kyle, and I walked from their apartment on Bleecker Street in a heavy evening rain. The gutters swiftly swelled with the run-off. At Broadway Kim announced that she is having her first period after her abortion. The cramps are killing her, but she said, "I'll feel better after a drink."

We carried a pint bottle of vodka to avoid paying for drinks at CBGBs.

I saw a young man on the sidewalk. He was soaked to the bone and I recognized Kim's admirer. Barry Miller, an actor from SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER. His character jumped off the Verrazano Bridge. He was hopelessly in love with Kim, who ignored him, until he said, "You should kidnap me, the MGM will pay the ransom."

"Only if I get to beat you up. It has to look real." I was annoyed at his joining us and Kyle said, "Yeah, maybe we could get $20,000 for you."

"I'm worth more than that."

You're no John Travolta." Kim loved the star of the disco movie. "Plus kidnappers always get caught."

"How much money you have on you, Barry?"

"A couple of hundred."

"Perfect, then you can finance the kidnapping."

Kim, Kyle, and I discussed leaving cryptic notes telling the studio how we were torturing their 'star'.

"We can cut off an ear lobe." Just like the Italian gang did to Jean Paul Getty's grandson.

"I'm not paying you to cut off my ear."

"It's just an left lobe. It's not like you wear earrings."

"You're all crazy." He flagged down a taxi. He was off to the Plaza. Alone. Maybe someone would recognize him there.

We reached CBGBs and sat against the wall. Kim poured drinks underneath the table. The Ramones came on last. They were great. I got a little drunk and we decided to not kidnap Barry.

"Not a chance," protested Kim. "I could stand him for more than a few minutes."

"So it's off."

"Maybe."

All of us like maybes.

Especially at CBGBs. LATER

Alice told me about a date.

"You went out with someone else?"

"You said you didn't want to go to the David Bowie Concert and someone invited me."

"Who?"

"That guy we were walking with the other night."

I recalled a roundish young man with a hooked nose, who had defended Bowie.

No competition, but she broke off the conversation to be at a function for a goodbye to her senior year away from Ohio.

LATER

Walking etiquette.

I hate people with umbrellas. They're always trying to poke out your eyes, as they blindly strolled down the sidewalk. I was walking with Bruce down Christopher Street. He had come down from Boston for a weekend of sin on the Hudson docks. I shoved one man out of the way.

"I can't take this. Someone is going to blind me. In feudal days the right of way was determined by might. Everyone got out of the path of a King. The Aztec monarch Montezuma's servants cleared the ground of any stones whenever he alit from his litter. Cortez was impressed by this."

"So impressed that he destroyed the Aztec empire."

"Back then people respected their betters and did so until the revolution of the last few centuries. Now everyone thinks they're just as good as anyone else. There are no rules. It's a democratic free-for-all of the masses."

"So you're better than everyone elseThe only time they stand aside is if your big or mean."

"I step aside for cripples and women, but sometimes for men too and I curse myself for that and the next time a man tries to get into my space I will become an unmovable object."

"Yes, Mr. Nice Guy."

LATER

The letters to Libby have returned without any forwarding address. The blonde has vanished into New York or elsewhere. We only fucked twice in Boston. Neither of us knew the other.

LATER

I have a sharp pain in my side. So bad it doubles me over.

LATER

Alice feels nice to sleep with. I will miss her, when she returns to Ohio for graduation, and told her that with tears in my eyes. Alice said, "I feel so helpless when you cry."

I said nothing about myemotions, but she sometimes feels, as if she's being tested and unfairly by me. Maybe it's better to let her go into the theater world to a future she knows is see coming, but why would I want to leave someone I love.

Because I'm fucked up.

FOR FREEDOM 1978

The Rolling Stones are almost forty. Russia is stagnant America repressed The Beatles are dead So is Hitler But I am alive Running for shelter is useless Nuclear bombs destroy everything And death comes so fast. A flash. Before you hear Before you see Before you feel Ending the Atomic Age And I couldn't care less, Because all I want is a white-on-white Cadillac before I go.

May 4, 1978 - Journal entry

Shitting is a great release of tension. Antonio at the Ebasco dining room and I share the same schedule.

"Every time I eat here, I gotta take a shit 30 minutes later."

"Right before we serve lunch."

"Like clockwork."

"And then at 2."

Tick-tock."

I had only been constipated once in my life at fourteen. I didn't shit for two days and suffered an excruciating pain in my bowels. No one was home at my parents' house and I finally sat on the toilet for an hour, then I found an enema plunger and followed the directions. Warm water up my ass. Ten minutes later release and relief.

LATER

Today I have not one cent. I jumped the turnstile of the subway, both coming and going to Ebasco on Wall Street. My bag was stuffed with left-overs from the executive dining room. I was prepared for the worst, but arrived at the SRO hotel to find a letter from the IRS.

$308.90.

The last money I'll received for teaching at South Boston High School.

They are still having riots over bussing.

I'm glad to be away from all that hate.

Now all I have to do is find a place to cash my check.

Peter Nolan Smith - CLUB 57 Reading @ MoMA 2/8/2018

Peter Nolan Smith Reading - CLUB 57 READING AT MoMA February 8, 2018

4PM at the CLUB 57 Exhibition at MoMA

11 W 53rd St, New York, NY 10019

Readings by Peter Nolan Smith with friends; Ann Magnuson, Willem Dafoe, and Larry Fleischman

Fotos by Anthony Scibelli, Peter Nolan Smith, and Kim Davis

Video by Eric Marciano

Music by Andrew Pollock

Tickets are free, but first come first served.

Sign in at 2PM and pick up tixs at 3:30.

From FAMOUS FOR NEVER

"New York City in 1978 was $5 short of bankruptcy. Budgets were slashed from every department. Arsonists torched the Bronx for fun and profit. Thousands of cars were stripped to the metal in Brooklyn. Harlem emergency wards were overwhelmed by shooting victims, while heroin ODs became the leading cause of teenager death for Queens. When Staten Island announced a referendum to secede from the city, no one accused the distant borough of treason, because the worst was yet to come."

Sleeping Beauty

The actress Tilda Swinton has been scheduled to sleep in a glass box at Mew York's Museum of Modern Art throughout the month as a performance called THE MAYBE. Museum goers enjoy the spectacle of celebrity within arm's length, but the talented Ann Magnuson related her sleeping beauty story at Area in 1983. "Eric Goode and Sean Hauseman set up a bed in one of their dioramas along the corridor at the entrance. When I heard they were paying someone $100 a night to just sleep there, I said HIRE ME! (I was so broke.) It was a nightmare. Strobe lights going off in the room, you could hear the disco music even earplugs, assholes were pounding on the plexiglass window screaming WAKE UP BITCH! I toughed it out for a few hours then quit. Made Eric pay me the full $100." $100 was good money back in 1983. Hell, I'd do it now for the same sum, but who would want to watch me sleep. HAL WINDSTON the great London Art Spiv said the following about Tilda's slumber, "I don't get the tilda-swinton-sleeping-in-a-box thing at moma, ny. well, I do, but it's depressing. why give away valuable museum real estate to a non-artist? anyway, james franco has that territory well sewn up. wasn't tilda's box (office) a cornelia parker piece from 1996 now being repackaged as a tilda original? can someone please pour in some formaldehyde? Or Jello.