listen:there's a hell
of a good universe next door;let's go
—e. e. cummings

first met Peter Leroy one cold afternoon in the winter of 1962, in Lamont Library at Harvard, where I was a sophomore. I was sitting in a chair at a large table, studying a German lesson. I had my chair tilted back, my legs crossed, my feet up on the edge of the table. The German textbook lay in my lap. The library was crowded, the room was warm, and I was tired. I dozed. When I woke up, I was lying on the floor. My books were scattered around me, people were laughing, and I was embarrassed. I gathered my things and rushed out of the library, and in the cold air the memory of a dream returned to me. In the dream, or at least in the memory of the dream, I saw an island, a small one, and on that island a nameless little boy sitting on a dilapidated dock in the sunny warmth of a summer day, dabbling his feet in the water, playing a game: he was trying to bring the soles of his bare feet as close as he could to the surface of the water without touching it. I have told that story so many times now that I no longer know which parts of it are facts. I've altered the details over the years, but the point of the story remains the same, and that is its single essential fact, its truth: that the memory of that dream has never left me, and even all these years later the dream and the world that has grown from it continue to surprise me. The center of that world is Peter Leroy, the character who grew from the little boy on the dilapidated dock.

Here is Peter's version of what I've told you:

One cold winter afternoon, I was sitting on a bench at the town dock, looking toward Small's Island, feeling desperate and alone, and I let myself drift into a daydream. In the dream, I was about seven. I was sitting on the dilapidated dock on the island, in front of the abandoned hotel, dabbling my feet in the water. A sudden sound surprised me, and I raised my head. There, in front of me, not more than a few yards away, was a young man in a rowboat, staring at me. He wore a puzzled look. I waved and smiled. He seemed to be astonished to see me, and when I realized that he and I were having the same dream, I was astonished to see him.

That night, lying in bed, I figured it out. This is what must have happened: On that cold winter afternoon I insinuated myself into the mind of Eric Kraft, who was dozing over a German lesson at the time. When he woke up, he found that he'd fallen to the floor. People were laughing, and he was embarrassed. He gathered his things and rushed out of the library. In the cold air, the memory of a dream returned to him, surprising him. He recalled seeing a little boy, sitting on a dock, in the summer sun, dabbling his feet in the water: me. I have been living in Kraft's mind ever since.

That must be true, from Peter's point of view. From my point of view, matters are a little different, something like the situation that I suggest when I begin readings from Peter's work with this invitation:

Imagine, please, an island, a small one, not in some pellucid subtropical sea, but in a gray bay, shallow, often cold, and on the island imagine an old hotel, where an aging dreamer, Peter Leroy, lives with his beautiful wife, Albertine Gaudet.

Albertine runs the hotel, and Peter spends much of each day sitting in a room on the second floor, writing the Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy, his life story.

If you could look over his shoulder and watch him at work, you would be likely to find that he was rewriting an episode from his past, making of his life a story that it never was, because when he reminisces he finds that he's as interested in the possibilities as he is in the facts, and also because memory, like an old radio receiver, picks up a lot of static.

I have come to think of "Peter Leroy" as the name I give to my imagination, and of "Small's Island" as the place in my mind where my imagination resides, an island apart from the painful kingdom of time and place. I visit that island every day. I'm going there now.-You come too.

Eric Kraft is the author of The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy.

© Eric Kraft