OCCUPANTThe sad mailbox of my extreme youth, what did it ever deliver? The only...
A CRITICPick up your socks. Clean the house once in a while. Go to the dentist. ...
HISTORIANPiles and piles of books, boxes of documents, photographs, bones, shreds of clothes...
YOU WHO KNOWI was just enough bigger that I could wrestle you into the clean straw of the mow...
GRIFFY LAKEI spread my smooth water like a lap and caught the trees' faces where they fell...
Dear Eric,
A chicken is a touchy creature. They scatter with dust and feathers
and squawking at almost any noise. High-strung, dumb, stinking of
ammonia, they peck at their cage corners with nervous pride.
Also, they die a lot. When I was drinking heavy and raising chickens,
I found the daily burden of dead birds a hindrance to my thirst. I
stopped digging single graves and began tossing fowl bodies into my
empty silo. Mass burial. Once a week (Sundays) I'd get drunk and stick
my head in, mingling words of hope and comfort with mournful bird-like
chirps.
Well, anyway, you know how sick I got after I sold the farm. Swollen
and weak, I finally had to give up even my beer. And, of course, your
Dad would have called you by now to let you know I'm dead. I just
thought I'd write to tell you that I got to heaven after all and it's
not such a bad place. The walls and streets are lined with golden
bottles of Miller's, and the angels come flying by with silver trays
of whiskey, singing hosannas. Best of all, there's not a damn
chicken anywhere.
Uncle Al