Window of the Elephant Man
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“ … he would have to expose his nakedness and piteous deformities before a gaping crowd.” Frederick Treves, in The Elephant Man and Other Reminiscences (1923)
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He remembered the lock of heavy doors just before “voluntary” was defined
yaw surrender of shoelaces and belt
purgatory of over-starched bed
gargoyles in midnight mirrors
How black curtains encircled, chained and twisting in Houdini’s tank
upside-down in water walls
a spasm imagined in silent film
Conversations of such stilted fails that “normal” had no anagrams
advice that one should feel no disgrace
how tedious the condescensions that pause for thanks
The camaraderie of dispossessed minds acted out in hapless pill-cup capers
imagined privacies of open-door rooms
prisons of pastel open floor plans
The bestiary of the stigmatized
a boulder of sleep rumored to be an accountant
a single mother emaciated trembling from remorse
a teen who failed at suicide with beer and Xanax
construction worker, a dad, who came close with a noose
He remembered the bolts on 7th floor windows
considering the afterlife of The Elephant Man
whether he kept his burl head and boil skin
whether his playing-card houses stayed upright
He remembered the grace and shame
of a suffocating relief
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