Three Dollar Shirt

T'was on Sunday he sat, there upon the pew,
In his three dollar shirt, for in his youth,
He was known as "the Kingfish",
His brother was a shadow boxer,
Who danced about the light,
Of the river campfire night,
While my brothers and me,
Tried to sleep, while fighting mosquitoes,
There under the netting, watching and listening,
To these two brothers tell their tales,
There upon the banks of Bowl Slough...

The week before, he saddled his horse,
And rode into the river bottom,
Bringing back A fine hog,
And tied behind his saddle,
Were six shoats in two gunny sacks,
For to town he did take,
And sold down at Saturdays barn,
Returning with flour, salt n' soda,
Nor a cent was spent on whiskey,
Or playing a game of cards,
But he did buy himself a three dollar shirt,
Which he wore tis Sunday day...
Remarks were quietly made,
As he entered the church,
Saying that he looks just like Huey P.,
When Huey came through this land...

Huey P. came and stood,
There on that charred pine stump,
They said was burnt by the Pentecost,
When lighting struck on a sunny day,
Huey P. preached from that stump,
And sounded like a coon hound,
Who had treed a coon,
And telling that coon, you may be higher than me,
But eventually, you will want a persimmon,
I will stay here and bay,
Until you come down from that tree.

We sat upon the wagon of cane, and bags of peanuts,
And after he had finished, and came to visit us all,
We offered Huey P. some,
He said that he took not from the poor farmer,
But if you vote for me,
I will take from Standard Oil,
He was there too,
Listening to Huey P.,
Standing by the Pentecostal stump,
But today, he sits quietly in his pew,
In his three dollar shirt,
And as always, at request time,
He sings in his piney woods cowboy voice,
There in that three dollar shirt,
Just a closer walk with thee,
Oh Jesus, hear this cowboy plea...


This was inspired by a man who I grew up with, and around the 8th grade, he dropped out, as did several of the men who I grew up with...I and one other man stayed the twelve year course, having picked up another one in our sixth year, a year older than us...This man dropped out from harassment over his $3 dollar shirts...His father was a logger and employed as many as he could...He eventually, I learned got his GED, and got into college...His conversation inspired me...There were many of us there in those classrooms with $3 dollar shirts...Many had home made flour sack shirts...My baptism shirt I cherished...One of the few cloth shirts I ever owned...The real value in anyone is the internal value....This I learned in my Economist education...And the best education is from the village that you came from....from story tellers who had a message to deliver...

She Was Just An Old Woman

To some, she was just an old woman,

others had an everlasting love for her,

whose spirit was both stern and compassionate,

to those that she guarded and delivered.

Her yard was always swept,

with borders of blooms,

and at her porch's edge,

grew her masterpiece,

where the rainwaters dripped.

Her labors of love,

over quilts and patched jeans,

a trade she fulfilled,

while sitting in her porch rocker,

with her incantations of job.

To some, she was just an old woman,

others had an everlasting name love for her

they knew that the name she carried,

was but an earthly passing...

I read this a number of years back in Elko, at one of my first readings, much like the late Montana poet, who met me outside Colorado Springs where I read, commented me on the piece that I read there...Skinny Rowland...Skinny had a saying that he wrote to forget, not to remember. ..I liked this honestly of the late Montanan Cowboy...And to honored by such a great American meant much to me...I write not to remember but to get that "stuff' out of my head...Again, the year that I read this piece, after I had left the room at the Elko Convention center, there stood the great-sober...-the old horse doctor himself...baster black... He commented on this verse, and to have received such an acknowledgement was if Faulkner, Hemingway, or other greats had posed their positive thoughts......One nite at the upper room above the Stockmans Cansino before he got hitched up behind the plow again...baster was leaning up against the wall with his chair, there in the corner, fearful that if he moved his recliner would collapse...I would dare not to call him intoxicated, but I felt that he was securing that wall whereas it would not fall upon us...Reclined with such balance...Ian would might say that the cowboys gets drunk and the muse places his lyrics in balance....