A Portal To Marlon
Socrates: Pao. Where have you been?
I've been writing scripts but nobody taught me how to do it. How do you do it?
Socrates: And why do you think you can do such a thing?
Arrogance.
Socrates: But your voice is still muffled?
Austin said it's okay to be embarrassed by audaciousness.
( But he also said don't talk about your process. Nobody cares. )
Nevertheless, a while back, I had a magical moment, worthy of sharing, stupid word.
I found a picture of Tennessee Williams on Bill Clerk's table.
Inside a big pile of images.
That had made a 'stop'.
Diana, had reached out through time and space and said, "Paolina, learn from this artist."
So there I was, seeing him. Wait, is this real?
Yes I developed a roll, I need to send it to the sister. I'm sorry are you sure I can touch this?
There was even a roll that hadn't been developed, so Bill had developed it.
In these pictures Marlon was a wistful boy.
Doing homework, bored out of his mind.
He stops, He asks his mother to take pictures of him.
He puts on a Greek theatrical mask that she had sitting on the kitchen table.
He stands in his attic bedroom, by the window and he looks out at me, through time and space
I am unbelieving. Am I seeing this?
Why am I seeing you, nobody has seen these, how could I be seeing this?
I get very quiet,
The sky was very open.
The light was clean.
Was he on a farm? Was this the midwesr.
The sun was so clean
The room was the same as the phot from Patchin' place.
He must like ceilings sloping down on him.
The light was afternoon light, on another day it would be dusty.
The mother is extraordinary.
These masks are Etruscan.
Time is not real, I see you I can't speak into your eyes. they are inside the myth.
Hearing his heartbeat and feeling his thoughts.
Do you know who it was?
Marlon Brando.
Will he know someone saw these.
What happened to him, how do you give up on humanity.
On time.
You live these moments of connection and rush the rest.
Jaded is how I saw his work always giving up
From a roll of film that hadn't been developed.
There he was looking back at me, as a 16 year old.
See me touch my eternal thoughts.
When Marlon Brando died, all his personal photos were on Bill Clerk's table in the country.
Bill was his sister's best friend. So he was sending them to her at Patching Place.
(I also was a young artist myself, like we could have gone dancing.)
And in that pile was also the Tennessee Williams photo.
It was a picture of the two of them somewhere, from the time of Streetcar Named Desire, Now he's thirty maybe, some press tour to Mexico, or LA, sitting on a couch, a late night party. laughing uncontrollably.
Taken from someone's hacienda house, I could tell from the plaster walls.
I have never seen so much energy.
A visitation from the heroes and an invitation to join them, catch up Pao.
Bye Marlon and thank you Universe.
I'm Acting As If, deeper, tighter, glazing through time, ravenously.
Working as quickly as I can.
Pao 10/07/24
