Hollywoodland

Greta Garbo at 5th Ave. and 72nd St., no date. She left her cab at the corner and walked 20 steps. When she saw the photographer, she hailed another cab and fled.

He was much more beautiful to me, and much more interesting, and much more complicated than any of the parts that he played, or any of the performances that you saw.

But how am I to die?

At the hands of an economic system that grinds me into a broken husk mourning lost years and untested adventures?

Or at the claws of something very neat to look at?

“There is no choice,” I laugh, “for me anyway.” I say and hand you my wallet. Tomorrow morning, I’ll meet you at the diner, or I won’t, and either way breakfast is on me.

“I don’t want to be a bad woman in too many pictures in succession. Too much glamour, too much sin, repeated often, become monotonously dull. I’m speaking now about the screen, of course.”