Satori in Paris & Pic

by Jack Kerouac

“The boy,” he say, t’Aunt Gastonia, “you sure your husband and your father see eye to eye with you ’bout keepin that boy?” and she say, “The Lord shall bring mercy unto them.”

“Why you wantsa curse that boy when y’already cursed ever’body seven times? It ain’t his fault what his father done to your eyes, he’s jess a chile.”

“What fo you wantsa keep that boy in this house what has the curse laid on him, fool woman?” Uncle Sim yell.

“Tonight Satty night, ever’body git drunk and go to TOWN yonder and they rocks, thass what they do, yas’r.” I say, “What you mean rocks?”

“This here dancin. B’you cain’t go to no jamboree ’case you gotsa curse on you.”

I cain’t remember no more ’bout Aunt Gastonia’s house and ever’thing done happened there.

“Aunt Gastonia take care of you no matter what,” she say, and stroke m’head, and I fall asleep.

So Mr. Otis is gone, and Aunt Gastonia pray for me, and bring Miz Jones to pray for me too.

If it ain’t my brother, dog my cats,

If it ain’t my brother, dog my cats, and he change so much since he go away from me and grandpa, I cain’t for sure say who that man is standin in the door, ’case he gots a little bitty round hat on his head with a little bitty button on top of it, and hairs a-hangin from his chin p’culiar, and he all thin, and lean, and all drew-out tall, and sorry-lookin too. He laugh and laugh when he see me, and come over to the bed for t’catch me, and look at me in th’eye. “Here he is,” he say, and it ain’t nobody he talk it to, ’case he say it to hisself, and smile, and me, I’se so s’prised I don’t say nothin. Well, y’know, I’se so s’prised it make me sit up in the bed.

“I come here to fetch Mister Pic, ma’m, and bring him on my magic carpet up NORTH to NEW YORK CITY, your grace,”

and he don’t traipse about no more, and the chillun teeter on th’ edge of their feets,

“How come you here?” Aunt Gastonia ask my brother, and he tuck his hat under his arm and say, “Why, for to get my brother, that’s how come,” and he don’t traipse about no more, and the chillun teeter on th’ edge of their feets, ’case they wantsa laugh some more, but now the big folkses solemn actin.

“No, Sim, no, that boy’s sick and go hungry and cotch cold and ever’ single thing in the world will happen to him and he’ll turn bad, sinful bad, with that man, and the Lord shall drop it on my soul like the hot irons of hell and perdition, on your soul too, and on this house,”

“Well, I don’t want to interfere with you folks but I don’t guess I was wrong when I said it wouldn’t ever do to bring the boy here, ma’m, and likewise don’t guess he can stay here.”

Then Mr. Otis say, “I feel I owe it to this child’s grandaddy to see he’s taken care of proper”

Then Mr. Otis say, “I feel I owe it to this child’s grandaddy to see he’s taken care of proper” and he turn to my brother, and I don’t reckon he like my brother no more’n ever’body else, ’case he say, and shake his head, “It don’t ’pear to me like you can take care of this child, neither. You got a job up north?” “Yes’r, I got a job,” my brother say, and he make a plain face and tuck his hat under his arm again, but Mr. Otis don’t ’pear to ’gree with him, and say “Well, is that the only clothes you got to wear when you travel?” and ever’body look at my brother’s clothes, which ain’t much of a much, and Mr. Otis say, “All you got there is a Army jacket, and there’s holes in the side of your pants, and they don’t fit right much anyhow because they’re all swole up at the legs and come down to your ankles so’s I can’t see how you can take ’em off, and you’ve got a red shirt that ain’t been washed, and G.I. boots pretty well scraggly by now, and that there beret on your head, so how do you ever expect me to believe you’ve got a job when you come travelin on home like that?”

“First thing in the mornin I’ll call up and make whatever arrangements are necessary, and meanwhile the boy can stay here,”

“Y’ere’s a black cat spittin in the tree up yonder”

And Uncle Sim look, and come back in and say “Y’ere’s a black cat spittin in the tree up yonder” and he go back to sleep. Aunt Gastonia she say, “Black cat go ’way from my do,” and she make the sign, and go back to sleep likewise.

“I’se come to get Pic,” my brother say

Brother undone the screen from the window and say “Shh” and reach in, and Jonas say “Shh” and little Henry say “S” and I cotch brother’s neck, and out I go with my head first and then the feet, and dog my cats, and cat my dogs, and looky-here, if I ain’t out in that barnyard in the middle of the dark and ready to leave and go.

and off me and m’ brother go, ’cross the barnyard and over the fence and into the woods and don’t make a sound.

“Listen to me, Pic,” he say, “you jess go along with me till we get home and call me Slim like ever’body else do, hear?”

“Now say, you seen that black cat back yonder in the Jelkeys’ tree that had all them hound dogs barkin at it?

“Well there you go” he laugh. “Now say, you seen that black cat back yonder in the Jelkeys’ tree that had all them hound dogs barkin at it? I brung it there myself to make them dogs miss me, and didn’t it spit, and fetch them up fine and bring us good luck that old black cat? Well, lookout!” Slim say to a tree, and dodge of it, and duck behind it, and bark at it, and go “Fsst!” like a cat, and both of us laugh some. That’s the way he was, grandpa.

A fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth.

“Because your grandpa was born a slave and Mr. Otis’ grandpa owned him once, you never knowed that did you?”

Ever’body mean well, in their own pitiful way,

“Little man, your father was a wild man and a bad man and that’s all he was, or is, and whether he’s alive or dead and where-EVER he’s at tonight. Your mother’s long dead, poor soul, and nobody blamed her for be-comin crazy and dyin like she done. Boy,”

“This here’s the alley you’re goin to wait for me in whilst I get some sandwiches for the bus,”

“Yonder’s the chicken shack,” he say. “I’ll go cross the street quick, and don’t dass let nobody see you in case the Jelkeys done woke up and fix to send somebody find us, hear? Stand right here,”

Over the door they was a wheel spin in a screen, and go humm, humm, and behind it a body could hear still another humm-humm from far away and it sound like a biggener wheel than that. Well, I reckon that was the world wheel I heard then.

“Ain’t nobody know where I’m goin in this thing but my brother watch over me from now on.”

And we sit on the white posts with the shiny buttons in em and wait ’bout half an hour for the bus, or two half hours, I don’t recollect. Here it come. It come big and brawly in the road, and said “WASHINGTON” on it, and the man at the wheel jam down the speed to stop for us, and it go zoom-boom right by us like it NEVER stop, and spit sand and wind and a old hot smell in my face, but stop yonder jess for us, and we run for it. Well, when I seed that big machine I said to myself “Ain’t nobody know where I’m goin in this thing but my brother watch over me from now on.” I never see Aunt Gastonia no more now.

It was the wilderness Aunt Gastonia pray about when she pray agin it so loud.

I reckon we left North Carolina after ’bout a half hour, or two half hours, ’case the road done change from black to brown and on each side of it I didn’t get to see no more houses but jess the wilderness. I guess it was jess great big old woods without no houses, and dark? and black? and jess as solemn? It was the wilderness Aunt Gastonia pray about when she pray agin it so loud.

“Pic, you’re going to New York now, and ain’t it somethin, now ain’t it?”

“Yonder’s the Capitol dome darling”

“This here is the city of Washington the nation’s capitol where the President of the United States of America and ever’body is,”

All that land I told you we done roll over in the bus all night, here we was in the middle of it, ’case they never was a town so white and so laid out grand, and brother woke up and said “This here is the city of Washington the nation’s capitol where the President of the United States of America and ever’body is,” and he rub his eyes, and I look close and can see they’s a heap of things goin on yonder in Washington ’case I hear it hum all over when the bus slow down at the river red light and I put my head out the window to watch.

Well, and I never seed such a big sky, and so many fine, solemn clouds as passed over Washington of the United States ’at mornin.

It was mighty hot inside the city of Washington when we stopped there and had to change to another bus ’at said NEW YORK on it, and crowded?

“Baltimore next stop,”

“Please leave the windows alone, this happens to be an air-conditioned bus”

we look thu the window at them beautiful green fields, and Slim said they was MARYLAND,

travelin ain’t the easiest and pleas-ingest thing in the world but you shore gets to see many innerestin things and don’t go ’bout it backwards neither.

“We can sit up front now because we crossed the Mason Dixie line,”

When we got to Philadelphia folks got out the bus and me and Slim got ourselves a new seat smackdab up front in the driver’s window, and bought-up some ice-cold soda orange and ain’t nothin better when you feel sickish. Slim said “We can sit up front now because we crossed the Mason Dixie line,” and I axed him what that was, and he said it was the line of the law for Jim Crow, and when I axed him who Jim Crow was, he said “That’s you, boy.”

it’s jess in the head of Mason and Dixie, jess like all other lines, border lines, state lines, parallel thirty-eight lines and iron Europe curtain lines is all jess ’maginary lines in people’s heads

“I ain’t no Jim Crow anyhow,” I told him, “’case you know my name is Pictorial Jackson.” “Oh,” says Slim, “is that so? Well, I never knowed that, uh-huh. Looky-here Jim,” he said, “don’t you know about the law that says you can’t sit in the front of the bus when the bus runs below the Mason Dixie line?” “What for you call me Jim?” “Now Jim!” he says, and cluck-cluck at me solemn. “You mean to tell me you don’t know about that line?” “What line?” I say. “I ain’t seed no such a line.” “What?” he say. “Why, we just crossed it back there in Maryland. Didn’t you see Mason and Dixie holdin that line across the road?” “Well,” I says, “did we run over it or underneath it?” and I’se tryin to recollect such a thing but jess cain’t. “Well,” I say, “I guess I musta been sleepin then.” And Slim laugh, and push my hair, and slap his knee. “Jim, you kill me!” “What did that line look like?” I axed him, ’case I wasn’t old enough to know it was a joke yet, you see. Well, Slim said he didn’t know what such a line looked like neither on account he never seed it any more than I did. “But there is such a line, only thing is, it ain’t on the ground, and it ain’t in the air neither, it’s jess in the head of Mason and Dixie, jess like all other lines, border lines, state lines, parallel thirty-eight lines and iron Europe curtain lines is all jess ’maginary lines in people’s heads and don’t have nothin to do with the ground.” Grandpa, Slim said that jess as quiet, and didn’t call me Jim no more, and said to hisself “Yes sir, that’s all it is.”

“All aboard for NEW YORK”

“Pic, you had no call bein scairt last night when he come and carried you thu the woods and told you not to worry. Now, Pic, you gotsa grow up this minute for Slim. You ain’t no country boy now.”

“Here we are in New York”

When I seed New York was from that bus, and Slim poked me up from the seat and said “Here we are in New York” and I looked and the sun was red all over, I looked again, and rubbed my eyes to wake up, for grandpa, we was goin over a long big bridge at run over a whole sight of rooftops and all I has to do is look down to see the chillun runnin betwixt the houses below, Slim said it wasn’t New York yet, jess the HOBOKEN SKYWAY he said, and pointed up ahead to show me New York. Well I jess could barely see a whole heap of walls and lanky steeples way, way off yonder all cloudy inside the smoke. Then I looked all round, and grandpa, it was the most monstrous and tremenjous stretch of rooftops and streets, and bridges and railroads, and boats and water, and great big things Slim said was gas tanks, and walls, and junkyards, and power lines, and in the middle of it set this old swamp ’at’s got tall green grass and yalter oil in the water, and rusty rafts long the shore. It was a sight like I never dreamed to see. And here come more of it where we turn the bridge, and ever’thing’s so smoky and tremenjous, and so laid-out far I can’t watch at some least littlest point of it without I see some more heaped up yonder behind it in the fog and smoke.

the sun was peekin thu a big hole in the clouds up in Heaven, and was sendin down great long sun-fingers ever’whichway from the hole, and it was all jess so rosy and purty like if’n God come down thu the smoke to see the world.

Well grandpa, and that ain’t all:—I told you the sun was red, and that was ’case jess then the sun was peekin thu a big hole in the clouds up in Heaven, and was sendin down great long sun-fingers ever’whichway from the hole, and it was all jess so rosy and purty like if’n God come down thu the smoke to see the world. Well jess before I woked up I guess ever’body in New York done put on they lights, and I guess it was dark then, on account now all them lights they put on was caught feeble and strange in the red sunlight and ever’where I look was them po lights burnin up ’lectricity for nothin, deep inside the streets and the alleys, up on the walls, up on top the bridges, thisaway in the awful fog and thata-way on the soft rosy water, and they jess tremble and shake jess like ever’thing’s a big old campfire folks done lit before sundown and didn’t dass put it out yet, ’case they knowed it wasn’t no real day for long. Well, next thing you know, the sun turn purple and blue and leave jess one peel of fire on the cloudbank, and it gets almost dark.

Well, now I told you how fearsome and grand New York was when I first seed it, and that ain’t all.

Well, now I told you how fearsome and grand New York was when I first seed it, and that ain’t all. The bus come down into a tunnel and whoosh! it and ever’body else go barrelin along the walls, and it warn’t dark in there but bright as you like and all lit-up jolly. “Now we’s under the Hudson River,” brother say, “and wouldn’t it be somethin if that river bust thu and come down on our heads?” I didn’t dass guess ’bout that till we come out the other side, and when we did I plum forgot to guess, and I reckon most folks is like that, ain’t they grandpa, till the day such a thing happen to them? The bus come out that LINCOLN TUNNEL it was called, and a great yaller light shine up the front of it, and ain’t nobody but one man walkin on the street, and I look at him and he look at me too. Well, I guess that man said to hisself “There’s a little boy comin to New York for the first time and cain’t do nothin but gawk at a man like me ’at’s so busy in New York and got so many things to do.”

And here we was in New York, and it didn’t look half grand now we was inside it on account you couldn’t see far with all them walls risin clear up on every side.

“Them’s skyscrapers,” Slim said when he seed me look up.

well, you can see how t’ain’t pos’ble to make a body unnerstand it lessen they done come and looked for theirselves.

Grandpa, all the folks you do see, and things they do, and all the streets you do see, and the places there is, and whilst you gotsa keep in mind all the folks and streets you don’t see, at’s round the corner and way yonder ever’whichaway, and up in the skyscrapers, and down in the subway—well, you can see how t’ain’t pos’ble to make a body unnerstand it lessen they done come and looked for theirselves.

Brother and me got off at Hundred Twenty Five street in Harlem.