“Did you ever know lonliness?
Did ever know need?
Do you remember just how long a night can get?
When you are barely holding on,
and your friends fall asleep,
They don’t see the blood that’s running in your sweat.
Will those who mourn be left uncomforted?
While you’re up there just playing hard to get?”From “Hard to Get” by Rich Mullins (Jesus Record)
The reason I was asking about tall tales is that Bobby Beck and I are working on a book together. He is working on illustrations, and I am desperately trying to pen the text. The book is tentatively titled The Ballad of Pecos Bill: An Epic for the Cowboy Campfire. It is a poetic retelling of the old tall tale of Pecos Bill.
So I want some feedback. Here is a portion of the text. The verse isn’t perfect yet; this is still a very early draft. Those of you with children, is this something you would find compelling to read to your kids before bedtime? Please be gentle with your criticism, though; writing is a very disrobing thing, and I feel very inadequate to tell this story. I am not saying that I don’t want negative comments; please, if something needs to be fixed, help me.
Ok, so here goes:
THE BALLAD OF PECOS BILL:INVOCATION
Oh., the tumbleweed Muse rolls across the plain,
The sagebrush and cactus are her only friends,
The prairie dog watches the Muse’s dust-train,
The Muse never pauses, her trip never endsThe Muse hears the play of the Coyote’s pups.
The new man-like cub has skin that’s pure white,
He wrestles, he lunges, he howls, and he scraps,
A kyoat that ugly should know how to fight.Soon the Muse feels a furious earthquake of hooves,
A thousand wild horses are running unbound.
A wild Widow-Maker with nothing to lose,
Leads on these rough broncos with frightening sound.The Muse tumbles by the great Rio Grande.
Those waters, they’re swirling across a rock-bed,
They’ll soon be diverted by one mighty man,
His cattle will water and men will be fed..The tumbleweed Muse rolls past a fair maid,
A match for a single man, tougher than two.
She’ll out-cuss an outlaw who’s wielding a blade.
The Queen of the Prairie, she’s called Sluefoot SueThe tumbleweed’s snatched by a reckless wind,
This Devil devours each ranch that he finds.
He hungers for chaos, kills men with a grin,
The Cyclone eats all and leaves nothing behind.So tumbleweed Muse, please sing us your song,
The song of a man who never knew loss,
Who has won the Wild West, put right what was wrong.
The tough Pecos Bill, whose path you have crossed.BOOK 1: CONNESTOGAS AND COYOTES
There once was a fellow named Big Will McDuff
The Green Isles had never seen one quite so tough.
He’d drink pint after pint with a cheek full of snuff,
And no one was so brave to cross him.One day Big Will, he just up and gathered his kin,
He said, “We’re a movin’, gonna start once again.�
And they moved to America, where’d they never been,
Where the land was ripe for the takin’.Now Will, he was mighty, and so was his wife,
She’d borne him twelve children, I swear on my life.
They piled in that wagon, one shotgun and knife,
To the West for to find their fortune.That Conestoga was crowded, the children were loud,
Big Will he regretted ever begetting this crowd,
As they crossed the wide prairie, Will cried aloud,
“I’ll be outta’ my mind by the mornin’.�Then Bill saw two eagles, high up in the sky,
He said to his darling, “Now, Kate, don’t you cry,
But it’s time that we taught our eaglets to fly.�
She agreed, though her heart was a-throbbin’.So Kate kissed each young child, and then, one by one.
She set each one free, like birds into the bright sun,
They’d see the vast prairie, and break out in a run,
With a war-whoop, they’d leave Ma behind them.Now Ma wasn’t worried, she knew they’d be fine.
For McDuffs are born with an extra tough spine.
She knew that she’d see them on down the line,
And they’d have some stories worth tellin’.As she picked up her youngest, she felt great fear
Her Young Baby William’d be five in a year,
But she kissed her son’s forehead and scratched his full beard,
And she let him climb down from the wagon.Young Will McDuff Junior, he watched his folks go,
But he shed not one tear, it was meant to be so,
He belonged in the open, where the great winds blow,
And this was no time for a’squawlin’As evening drew near, he heard songs on the plain,
The howling of coyotes exited his brain,
He struck out to see just what friends he could gain,
Among the wild dogs doing the singin’In no time at all, the small boy found the pack.
As he approached those kyotes, they didn’t attack
They all had been fooled by the thick hair on his back
Young Will became one of their brethren.Soon William forgot about being a boy,
He breathed and ate kyote and made kyote noise.
Nothing on earth could bring him such joy,
As lookin’ at the moon and howlin’.
Just thinking about our friends in G’Town. Here are some lyrics about the town by my man Paul Curreri (you can find this on Songs for Devon Sproul).
Greenville
Oh, perhaps I might sleep, but the screen door’s a guilt bull
Stuck plainly on sticking me through.
Had I the blood boiled, or the fist like a marker,
I’d haul off, and dot his eye blue.
But that bull just wants a word, the night just wants to barrel,
Bet the sunrise’ll want a piece of me too.
The back window creaks as I head over heels;
You say, “Greenville,” so it’s Greenville with you.Heart-broken lovers breathe teardrops and incense –
My collar: the history of that.
Heart-breaking lovers breathe rust-tasting lightning
And cough for the incense back.
I’m a heart-breaking lover, heart-broken and dead
As the hometown when the eyes see you through.
Neither running nor hiding, no, I’m simply leaving.
If you’re going to Greenville, that’ll do.Cruel the fiddley night — course you can’t trust the night
Where both nothing and everything looks new.
But all o’sudden it dawns: I am running — not running away –
But closing in on what I’m running to.
My brushes have been caked like eyes in the morning.
Recall your eyes in the morning as carillons,
Played with the will of some daydreaming student.
Play on, good driver, play on!The heart-broken scars in the moonlight, they follow
And try to patch themselves up with me.
Fragile as calf legs, I plead to pull over;
I’m gonna need you to sing me to sleep.
Old traveling companion, load up your bow
With the killingest kisses you can.
Cry while you kiss me; mumble the beauty.
We’re halfway to Greenville again.
Listen to the tune here….
You need to buy this man’s books. He is the current American poet laureate. Here’s a clever example of his poetry. Click on the title so see what I mean
“The Meaning of Life”
Letter by Garrison Keillor
To know and to serve God, of course, is why we’re here; a clear truth that, like the nose on your face, is near at hand and easily discernable but can make you dizzy if you try to focus on it hard. But a little faith will see you through. What else will do except faith in such a cynical, corrupt times? When the country goes temporarily to the dogs, cats learn to be circumspect, walk on fences, sleep in trees, and have faith that all this woofing is not the last word. Time to shut up and be beautiful, and wait for morning. Yahooism, when in power, is deaf, and neither satire nor Gospel will stay its brutal hand, but hang on, another chapter follows. Our brave hopes for changing the world sank in port, and we have become the very people we used to make fun of, the old and hesitant, but never mind, that’s not the whole story either. So hang on.
What keeps our faith cheerful is the extreme presence of gentleness and humor. Gentleness is everywhere in daily life, a sign that faith rules through ordinary things; through cooking and small talk, through storytelling, making love, fishing, tending animals and sweet corn and flowers, through sports, music and books, raising kids-all the places where the gravy soaks in and the grace shines through. Even in a time of elephantine vanity and greed, one never has to look far to see the campfires of gentle people. If we had no other purpose in life; it would be good enough to simple take care of them and goose them once in a while.
