River Phoenix
In both Running on Empty
and My Own Private Idaho
the opening scene
is a side profile
of River’s face.
There is a vacancy
in both. Running on Empty
playing baseball
in round, wire-frame
glasses covering
half of his
symmetry.
Smooth ivory skin,
concentrated brow,
a desire for innocence,
normalcy. In My Own Private Idaho
his face bears the weight
of a patchy, scraggly beard
and ratty moustache,
we wonder
before he tells Keanu Reeves
he loves him
and wants to fuck him
can he even grow one
a full moustache and beard
we mean
or is the absence
his poor attempt
at manhood
no longer
the silk of a Florida
childhood
or the insecurity of
adolescence, but what
it finally means
to grow up.