We was in the frontyard,
working on the truck,
listening to Hank Sr,
and arguing about Grandma Billy’s
Alabama Caviar, whether
the squirrel brains
were jarred or canned
‘fore going in the deep freeze.
Storms a-comin’, I said.
No mowing’ today, Tuck said.
His greasy coveralls collected
little drops of skywater,
and we proceeded to close
the radiator hospital,
finish the shine just in time,
when we heard the siren.
Then the weather took a turn for the worse,
and the Heavens opened up,
so Tucker tore off for the shed
and I’s rundoft under the sycamore
when then the dog got struck
by lightning and lit on fire
like something Satan made
while twisting his evil moustache.
Doggonit, I’ll be damned,
that dog didn’t ever get dead,
just turned blind for a time
and had a few tantrums
which made Uncle David nervous,
fer it was his pooch
that he found near the railroad
when Aunt Linda kicked him
out to get his drinking right.
Y’all wouldn’t believe it
even if the Pastor himself
had put his hand on the good book
and swore it with Sunday belief,
but after that goldarn day,
the dog caught every squirrel in the trailer park
without the blessing of sight,
so Grandma Billy had Alabama Caviar for a year.
It was a good season,
‘spite them hoodlums
takin’ Grandma Billy’s prescriptions,
and me losing my job at the mart;
we had a decent Christmas,
and we thought we were going
to have a good new year,
specially because of the rain.
That is until the dog got runned over,
Uncle David moved to Kentucky,
Tucker got hooked on crank,
Grandma Billy got the cancer on a Tuesday
and died on a Wednesday,
and I’s figured that sticking around here
wouldn’t amount to a hill of beans,
so’s I went to live in Tupelo with a gal called Betsy.