American Folksongs & Ballads

Stagolee

The American Folk Experience

Stagolee

by John Fitzsimmons | The American Folk Experience

~Traditional 

 

Stagolee was a bad man,
Ev'rybody knows.
Spent one hundred dollars
Just to buy him a suit of dothes.
     He was a bad man
     That mean old Stagolee

Stagolee shot BiUy de Lyons
What do you think about that?
Shot him down in cold blood
Because he stole his Stetson hat;
     He was a bad ma@
     That mean old Stagolee

Billy de Lyons said, Stagolee
Please don't take my life
I've got two little babes
And a darling, loving wife;
     You are a bad man
     You mean old Stagolee.

What do I care about your two little babes,
Your darling loving wife?,
You done stole my Stetson hat
I'm bound to take your life;
     He was a bad man,
     That mean old Stagolee.

The judge said, Stagolee,
What you doing in here?,
You done shot Mr. Billy de Lyons,
You going to die in the electric chair;
     He was a bad man
     That mean old Stagolee.

Twelve o'clock they killed him
Head reached up high
Last thing that poor boy said,
"My six-shooter never lied."
     He was a bad man,
     That mean old Stagolee.

If you have any more information to share about this song or helpful links, please post as a comment.

Thanks for stopping by the site! ~John Fitz

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I am indebted to the many friends who share my love of traditional songs and to the many scholars whose works are too many to include here. I am also incredibly grateful to the collector’s curators and collators of Wikipedia, Mudcat.org, MainlyNorfolk.info, and TheContemplator.com for their wise, thorough and informative contributions to the study of folk music. 

I share this scholarly research on my site with humility, thanks, and gratitude. Please cite sources accordingly with your own research. If you have any research or sites you would like to share on this site, please post in the comment box.  

Thanks!

 

Source: Wikipedia

For other uses, see Stagger Lee (disambiguation).
"Stack O' Lee Blues"
Single by Waring's Pennsylvanians
B-side"Stavin' Change"[1]
Released1923 (1923)
RecordedCamden, New Jersey, April 18, 1923
Length3:21
LabelVictor
Songwriter(s)Ray Lopez (credited on single)

"Stagger Lee" (Roud 4183), also known as "Stagolee" and other variants, is a popular American folk song about the murder of Billy Lyons by "Stag" Lee Shelton, in St. Louis, Missouri, on Christmas 1895. The song was first published in 1911 and first recorded in 1923, by Fred Waring's Pennsylvanians, titled "Stack O' Lee Blues". A version by Lloyd Price reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1959.

Background

Main article: Lee Shelton

The historical Stagger Lee was Lee Shelton, an African-American pimp living in St. Louis, Missouri, in the late 19th century. He was nicknamed Stag Lee or Stack Lee, with a variety of explanations being given: he was given the nickname because he "went stag" (attended social events unaccompanied by a person of the opposite sex); he took the nickname from a well-known riverboat captain called Stack Lee; or, according to John and Alan Lomax, he took the name from a riverboat owned by the Lee family of Memphis called the Stack Lee, which was known for its on-board prostitution.[2] Shelton was well known locally as one of the Macks, a group of pimps who attracted attention through their flashy clothing and appearance.[3] In addition to those activities, he was the captain of a black Four Hundred Club, a social club with a dubious reputation.[4]

On Christmas night in 1895, Shelton and his acquaintance William "Billy" Lyons were drinking in the Bill Curtis Saloon. Lyons was also a member of St. Louis' underworld, and may have been a political and business rival to Shelton. Eventually, the two men got into a dispute, during which Lyons took Shelton's Stetson hat.[5] Subsequently, Shelton shot Lyons, recovered his hat, and left.[6] Lyons died of his injuries, and Shelton was charged, tried, and convicted of the murder in 1897. He was paroled in 1909, but returned to prison in 1911 for assault and robbery. He died incarcerated in 1912.[7]

The crime quickly entered into American folklore and became the subject of song, as well as folktales and toasts. The song's title comes from Shelton's nickname—Stag Lee or Stack Lee.[8] The name was quickly corrupted in the folk tradition. Early versions were called "Stack-a-Lee" and "Stacker Lee", while "Stagolee" and "Stagger Lee" also became common. Other recorded variants include "Stackerlee", "Stack O'Lee", "Stackolee", "Stackalee", "Stagerlee", and "Stagalee".[9]

Early versions

A song called "Stack-a-Lee" was first mentioned in 1897, in the Kansas City Leavenworth Herald, as being performed by "Prof. Charlie Lee, the piano thumper".[10] The earliest versions were likely field hollers and other work songs performed by African-American laborers, and were well known along the lower Mississippi River by 1910. That year, musicologist John Lomax received a partial transcription of the song,[11] and in 1911, two versions were published in the Journal of American Folklore by the sociologist and historian Howard W. Odum.[12]

The song was first recorded by Waring's Pennsylvanians in 1923 and became a hit. Another version was recorded later that year by Frank Westphal & His Regal Novelty Orchestra, and Herb Wiedoeft and his band recorded the song in 1924.[13] Also in 1924, the first version with lyrics was recorded, as "Skeeg-a-Lee Blues", by Lovie Austin. Ma Rainey recorded "Stag O'Lee Blues", a different song based on the melody and words of "Frankie and Johnnie", the following year, with Louis Armstrong on cornet, and a version was recorded by Frank Hutchison on January 28, 1927, in New York, and is included in Harry Smith's famous Anthology of American Folk Music (Song 19 of 84).[10]

Before World War II, the song was commonly known as "Stack O'Lee". W.C. Handy wrote that it probably was a nickname for a tall person, comparing him to the tall smokestack of the famous steamboat Robert E. Lee.[14] By the time W.C. Handy wrote that explanation in 1926, "Stack O' Lee" was already familiar in United States popular culture, with recordings of the song made by pop singers of the day, such as Cliff Edwards.

The version by Mississippi John Hurt, recorded in 1928, is regarded by many as definitive.[10] In his version, as in all such pieces, there are many (sometimes anachronistic) variants on the lyrics. Several older versions give Billy's last name as "De Lyons" or "Delisle". Other notable pre-war versions were recorded by Duke Ellington (1927), Cab Calloway (1931), Woody Guthrie (1941),[10] and Sidney Bechet (1945).[15]

Lloyd Price version

"Stagger Lee"
Single by Lloyd Price
B-side"You Need Love"
ReleasedNovember 1958 (1958-11)
RecordedNew York City, September 11, 1958
Genre
Length2:20
LabelABC-Paramount
Songwriter(s)Lloyd Price, Harold Logan (credited on single)
Producer(s)Don Costa
Lloyd Price singles chronology
"No Limit to Love"
(1958) 		"Stagger Lee"
(1958) 		"Where Were You (On Our Wedding Day)?"
(1959)

Lloyd Price recorded an R&B rendition of the song as "Stagger Lee" in 1958, and it rose to the top of both the R&B and US pop charts in early 1959.[18] Although his version uses similar lyrics to previous versions of the song, his rendition features a different melody and has no lyrical refrain, making it shorter than previous recordings of the song. Price's version of the song was ranked number 456 on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Songs of All Time list, and also reached number 7 on the UK singles chart. Price also recorded a lyrically toned-down version of the song that changed the shooting to an argument between two friends for his appearance on Dick Clark's American Bandstand.[10]

Chart performance

Lloyd Price version

Chart (1959) Peak
position
UK Singles (The Official Charts Company)[19] 7
US Billboard Hot 100 1
US Hot R&B Sides (Billboard)[20] 1

All-time charts

Chart (1958-2018) Position
US Billboard Hot 100[21] 260

Other post-war versions

  • The song is sung by an African-American prisoner in Jack Black's autobiography You Can't Win.[26]
  • In 1949 an episode of the radio anthology series program Destination Freedom, written by Richard Durham, retold the "Tales of Stackalee".[27]
  • The song "Wrong 'Em Boyo" by the Jamaican rocksteady group the Rulers begins with a quotation from "Stagger Lee": "Stagger Lee met Billy and they got down to gambling / Stagger Lee throwed seven, Billy said that he throwed eight." The song was notably covered by the Clash on their 1979 album London Calling with an additional lyric to finish the verse: "So Billy said, 'Hey Stagger! I'm gonna make my big attack / I'm gonna have to leave my knife in your back.'"
  • Stagger Lee was the masked persona of wrestler Junkyard Dog, who donned the name and mask in 1982 due to an angle where he was forced to leave his wrestling territory for 90 days.
  • The version by Pacific Gas & Electric, was included on the soundtrack for Quentin Tarantino's film Death Proof, the second portion of the 2007 double-feature Grindhouse.
  • Blues musician Keb' Mo' performs his version in a scene from the 2007 film Honeydripper.
  • In Percival Everett's 2001 novel Erasure and its 2023 film adaptation American Fiction, black literature professor Thelonious "Monk" Ellison becomes frustrated with the success of books that exploit and sensationalize Black American poverty, violence, and crime, and writes a satire of these books, first titled My Pafology and then retitled Fuck, under the pseudonym "Stagg R. Leigh", and must then deal with the effects of his book being taken seriously by everyone and becoming wildly successful.
  • The cosmic horror novella My Heart Struck Sorrow by John Hornor Jacobs centers on an ethnomusicologist travelling the Southern United States in search of various versions of "Stagger Lee" in the belief that there is an ur-version of the song with supernatural qualities.[28]

See also

References

  1. ^ B-side artist listed as "the Virginians"
  2. ^ Brown, Cecil (2004). Stagolee Shot Billy. Boston: Harvard University Press. pp. 43–45. ISBN 978-0674028906.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: publisher location (link)
  3. ^ Brown, Cecil (2004). Stagolee Shot Billy. Boston: Harvard University Press. p. 23. ISBN 0674028902.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: publisher location (link)
  4. ^ Brown, Cecil (2004). Stagolee Shot Billy. Boston: Harvard University Press. p. 43. ISBN 978-0674028906.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: publisher location (link) Brown summarizes what little is known about the club as follows: "The Four Hundred Club was a 'social club,' but such clubs always had a moral front. (...) The Four Hundred Club may have been a type of black-and-tan club, catering to an interracial clientele, and as such would have been under pressure from reform policies." Brown cites a contemporary source from the newspaper St. Louis Star-Sayings, in which a member of the club states: "Mr. [Stack] Lee was our captain."
  5. ^ Brown, Cecil (2004). Stagolee Shot Billy. Boston: Harvard University Press. p. 23. ISBN 978-0674028906.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: publisher location (link) Based on the statements of witnesses, Cecil Brown retells the incident as follows: "Then Lyons grabbed Shelton's Stetson. When Shelton demanded it back, Lyons said no."
  6. ^ Brown, Cecil (2004). Stagolee Shot Billy. Boston: Harvard University Press. pp. 21–29. ISBN 0674028902.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: publisher location (link)
  7. ^ Brown, Cecil (2004). Stagolee Shot Billy. Boston: Harvard University Press. pp. 34–36. ISBN 0674028902.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: publisher location (link)
  8. ^ Brown, Cecil (2004). Stagolee Shot Billy. Harvard University Press. p. 102. ISBN 0674028902.
  9. ^ Buehler, Richard E. (1967). "Stacker Lee: A partial investigation into the historicity of a Negro murder ballad". Keystone Folklore Quarterly. 12: 187 and note. Retrieved March 20, 2013.
  10. ^ a b c d e "History". StaggerLee.com. Retrieved 17 February 2013.
  11. ^ Marshall, Matt (May 9, 2011). "A Brief History of Stagger Lee and Billy Lyons". American Blues Scene. Archived from the original on 22 February 2014. Retrieved 5 March 2013.
  12. ^ Buehler, Richard E. (1967). "Stacker Lee: A partial investigation into the historicity of a Negro murder ballad". Keystone Folklore Quarterly. 12: 187–191. Retrieved 5 March 2013.
  13. ^ "Herb Wiedoeft's Cinderella Roof Orchestra". Red Hot Jazz. Archived from the original on 2011-01-05. Retrieved 2010-10-13.
  14. ^ Handy, W.C. Handy (1926). Blues, an Anthology.
  15. ^ "1945–1946 – Sidney Bechet | Songs, Reviews, Credits | AllMusic". AllMusic.
  16. ^ Breihan, Tom (January 29, 2018). "The Number Ones: Lloyd Price's "Stagger Lee"". Stereogum. Retrieved June 3, 2023. And in 1959, the New Orleans R&B singer and former Army serviceman Lloyd Price took one of those versions to #1....Instead, it's a total blast of a song, a spirited New Orleans rumble...
  17. ^ Marsh, Dave (1989). The Heart of Rock & Soul: The 1001 Greatest Singles Ever Made. Plume. p. 161. ISBN 0-452-26305-0.
  18. ^ a b Whitburn, Joel (1996). Top R&B/Hip-Hop Singles: 1942–1995. Record Research. p. 12.
  19. ^ "officialcharts.com". Official Charts. Retrieved November 9, 2021.
  20. ^ Whitburn, Joel (2004). Top R&B/Hip-Hop Singles: 1942–2004. Record Research. p. 470.
  21. ^ "Billboard Hot 100 60th Anniversary Interactive Chart". Billboard. Retrieved 10 December 2018.
  22. ^ Are You Ready? in Discogs Retrieved 21 Oct 2019
  23. ^ The Youngbloods, Good and Dusty Retrieved June 12, 2015
  24. ^ "The Annotated "Stagger Lee"". Arts.ucsc.edu. Retrieved 22 August 2018.
  25. ^ "Largehearted Boy: Book Notes – Derek McCulloch ("Stagger Lee")". Largeheartedboy.com. Retrieved 22 August 2018.
  26. ^ Black, Jack (2021). You Can't Win. Vancouver, BC: Must Have Books. ISBN 978-1-77323-797-8. OCLC 1301911524.
  27. ^ MacDonald, J. Fred, ed. (1989). Richard Durham's Destination Freedom. New York: Praeger. p. x. ISBN 0275931382. Also see OCLC 1323028307, 44432637 for cassette and audio CD availability of the episode
  28. ^ Jacobs, John Hornor (2019). A Lush and Seething Hell. New York: HarperCollins. ISBN 9780062880840.
source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stagger_Lee

Source: Mainly Norfolk

Stagger Lee / Stagolee

[ Roud 4183 ; Laws I15 ; Ballad Index LI15 ; trad.]
John Gibbon sang Stakolee in 1957 on his Topic album John Gibbon’s Disc.

Trevor Lucas sang Stagger Lee accompanied by guitar and mouth-organ in full early Dylan mode from the 1963 Folk Attick recordings in Sydney—plenty of suck and blow braced harmonica playing between the verses, and very typical of that protest folk singer period. This recording was included in 1994 on the Friends of Fairport cassette Together Again – The Attic Tracks Vol. 4.

Jesse Fuller sang Stackolee in a recording made by Peter Kennedy at Cecil Sharp House on March 19, 1965. This track was included in the same year on Fuller’s Topic album Move On Down the Line. Joe Boyd commented in the album’s sleeve notes:

Of all the hero or villain legends in American folk music, Stackolee ‘that bad man’ appears in both white and Negro ballads, often with references to the supernatural powers of his ‘Five Dollar Stetson Hat’. There was a notorious family named Lee in Memphis during the late nineteenth century, and a longshoreman (stevedore) was often known as a stacker. The song was part of Ma Rainey`s repertoire long before she recorded it in 1925. There are several recorded melodies for the song, of which I think Jesse’s is the most interesting.

Martin Simpson sang Stagolee in 2007 on his Topic album True Stories. He commented in his liner notes:

I first learned Stagolee from Mississippi John Hurt and recorded it when I was 17. The origins of the story were long guessed at, but it was widespread amongst blues singers, songsters, old timey musicians, R&B singers and rock and rollers throughout the 20th century. In 2003, Harvard University Press published Cecil Brown’s book, Stagolee shot Billy, a superbly written account of the facts. Lee Shelton shot Billy Lyons on Christmas Night, in 1859. I’ve attempted to put some of the facts back into the song without losing the poetry. Facts aren’t everything, but these are all true stories in one way or another.

Snakefarm sang Staggerlee in 2011 on their Fledg’ling CD My Halo at Half-Light.

Links

See also the Mudcat Café thread Listen to different versions of Stagger Lee and Paul Slade’s essay A Christmas Killing: Stagger Lee.

Source: AmericanBluesScene.com

Stagolee

Today we’re bringing you another entry in American Blues Scene’s exclusive “Brief History of a Song” series.

The feud between Stagger Lee and Billy Lyons is as legendary as the one between the Hatfields and the McCoys; a truly American folk tale, retold countless times, about Stagger shooting Billy Lyons over, varyingly, a Stetson hat, a woman, a gambling debt, politics, or simply because Stagger was that mean of a man. Amazingly enough, the song may be the most re-recorded in history, with well over four hundred separate recordings to it’s name. A brief search of the Stagger Lee name could reveal recordings from Mississippi John Hurt, Furry Lewis, Lloyd Price, Professor Longhair, The Black Keys, Samuel L. Jackson, The Fabulous Thunderbirds, Wilson Picket, Taj Mahal, Fats Domino, Bob Dylan, Beck, Elvis Presley, Ike Turner, and a great many others.

Who was Stagger Lee, who goes by different names depending on the storyteller; Stagger, Stack-O-Lee, Stackalee, etc.? Was there a real Stagger Lee? Did he really run with Jesse James, have a magical Stetson, or take hell away from the devil when he died, as has been suggested?

The origins of this tale begin with a Christmas Eve bar fight in Saint Louis in 1895. The events of the murder were fairly commonplace; two friends, Billy Lyons and “Stagger” Lee Shelton, were drinking at Bill Curtis’s saloon and became enthralled in a conversation about politics. Billy grabbed Shelton’s hat in anger, and when he refused to return it, Shelton shot Billy in the gut, picked up his hat, and left. Lyons died from his wound shortly afterwards. That same night alone, five murders were committed in Saint Louis, but only one shot to world-wide infamy through a tangled web of politics, folklore, and raw persistence. The story was first covered in the St. Louis Globe-Democrat on December 28th, 1895. In 1896, the political scene was extremely tense, and with Saint Louis being one of the largest cities in the country, it was necessary for politicians to get every vote, including the black vote. This was increasingly relevant because the republicans were losing their stronghold, and because Shelton was a democratic organizer, and Lyons a Republican one, according to StaggerLee.com. The murder received significant exposure and political scrutiny, and resulted in a hung jury trial, after Stagger Lee had hired one of the most prominent lawyers in the state. Shelton’s case was retried in 1897, and Stagger Lee was found guilty of murder and sentenced to the notorious Jefferson penitentiary in Jefferson City, Missouri. It only took until 1902 or 1903, depending on the source, for the first printed lyrics referring to the Stagger Lee murder.

In 1909, then-Missouri governor Joseph Wingate Folk gave Shelton a full pardon on Thanksgiving day. By this time, folk versions of the Stagger Lee song were cropping up all across the South. The next year, legendary Library of Congress musicologist John Lomax received a partial transcription of what was called “The Ballad of Stagalee”, from a woman in Texas. She claimed that “this song is sung by the Negroes on the levee while they are loading and unloading the river freighters.” In 1911, Shelton broke into a man’s home,  murdered him, and was sent to prison, but by 1912, Shelton received yet another pardon from another governor, apparently due to political pressure. Before he could be released, the infamous Stack-O-Lee died in prison of tuberculosis.

In the 1920s, a number of varieties of “Stagger Lee” began to be recorded. Ma Rainey and her band, (including a young Louis Armstrong on cornet), recorded Stack O’Lee Blues in 1925. Duke Ellington recorded a version in 1927, and in 1928 Mississippi John Hurt recorded what is perhaps the most famous and most definitive version of Stagger Lee’s song in history.

Police officer, how can it be?
You can ‘rest everybody but cruel Stack O’ Lee
That bad man, oh, cruel Stack O’ Lee

Billy de Lyon told Stack O’ Lee, “Please don’t take my life,
I got two little babies, and a darlin’ lovin’ wife”
That bad man, oh, cruel Stack O’ Lee

“What I care about you little babies, your darlin’ lovin’ wife?
You done stole my Stetson1 hat, I’m bound to take your life”
That bad man, cruel Stack O’ Lee

…with the forty-four
When I spied Billy de Lyon, he was lyin’ down on the floor
That bad man, oh cruel Stack O’ Lee

“Gentleman’s of the jury, what do you think of that?
Stack O’ Lee killed Billy de Lyon about a five-dollar Stetson hat”
That bad man, oh, cruel Stack O’ Lee

And all they gathered, hands way up high,
at twelve o’clock they killed him, they’s all glad to see him die
That bad man, oh, cruel Stack O’ Lee

In 1931, folk great Woodie Guthrie sang a rendition of the song, likely adapted from John Hurt’s version, as the lyrics are very similar. During his field recordings, John Lomax often recorded the Stagger Lee song by various groups in the American South, from Texas to the Appalachia, often times in prisons. Some of these recordings can be found at the Library of Congress. Later, in 1941 and ’42, John’s son Alan recorded a number of versions during his own field recording trips for the Library of Congress. The song continued to capture the imaginations of singers and poets everywhere until 1958, when Lloyd Price released a version simply called “Stagger Lee”. The song exploded in popularity and became #1 on the Billboard Pop Charts. From there, dozens and eventually hundreds of recorded renditions of Stack’s story were spawned. In the 1960s, when Mississippi John Hurt was re-discovered, he would often play a folk-style story called “Stagolee” in which Stag and, interestingly enough, Jesse James, rob a card game in a coal mine. In 2007, Samuel L. Jackson played “Stack-O-Lee” in the movie Black Snake Moan, backed by Cedrick Burnside and Kenny Brown. Cedric is the grandson of legendary bluesman R.L. Burnside, who also sang popular versions of Stagger Lee’s song.

Stagger Lee has been sang about nearly countless times. His story has appeared in movies, poems, and even as it’s own comic book. Through every generation and nearly every musical style, Stagger Lee has made an appearance. Punk, Hawaiian, Heavy Metal, Disco, Rock, Blues, Folk, Bluegrass, Country, and Soul have all seen recorded versions, often with great popularity and by names as wildly famous as Elvis and the Isley Brothers. The story of bad Stagger Lee has continued to capture American’s, and then the world’s, imaginations for over 100 years.

To find a largely comprehensive documentation of 420+ “Stagger Lee” recordings, see StaggerLee.com

Performances, Workshops, Resources & Recordings

The American Folk Experience is dedicated to collecting and curating the most enduring songs from our musical heritage.  Every performance and workshop is a celebration and exploration of the timeless songs and stories that have shaped and formed the musical history of America. John Fitzsimmons has been singing and performing these gems of the past for the past forty years, and he brings a folksy warmth, humor and massive repertoire of songs to any occasion. 

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A Priori

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by | December 10, 2013 | Essays, Journal, Teaching | 0 Comments

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by | August 12, 2014 | Fires in the Belly, Songs | 0 Comments

I see it in your eyes
and in the ways you try to smile;
in the ways you whisper—I don’t know—
and put it all off for a while;
then you keep on keeping on
in the only way you know:
you’re scared of where you’re going
and who’ll catch you down below.

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by | February 8, 2019 | Essays, Journal, Teaching | 0 Comments

"But he hasn't got anything on!" the whole town cried out at last. The Emperor shivered, for he suspected they were right. But he thought, "This procession has got to go on." So he walked more proudly than ever, as his noblemen held high the train that wasn't there at...
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by | August 12, 2014 | Journal, Poetry | 0 Comments

Trying to only see what is in front of me my eyes are continually drawn away from this page and the work left to be done— my labored words etched and scratched away like fleeting mosaics in dry sand. I need a windowless cell to work the alchemy that shapes the...
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A Hard Sell

by | November 13, 2013 | Essays, Journal, Teaching | 0 Comments

     As a teacher, I am tired of the word blog, probably because the word “blogging” is incredibly limiting and myopic, especially for someone whose teaching is centered around an online curriculum with blogs front and center on my academic table. I sat through a...
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The Mystery Within

by | August 15, 2014 | Journal, Poetry | 0 Comments

EJ wanted a banana tree for Christmas so that early morning brought a plastic bag, a few meager roots and no directions. I bought some potting soil and a square cedar box EJ placed deliberately by a westward window. He gently splayed the roots, pressed the soil, and...
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Reflecting on Literature

by | March 27, 2017 | Essays, Journal, Teaching | 0 Comments

I am constantly asking my students (and myself) to reflect on the literature they, and I, read. As I have grown older—and not necessarily wiser—I find myself only reading literature that I am sure will prod me out of my intellectual and emotional torpor, like a lizard...
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Make Something out of Something

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It's hard to make chicken salad out of chicken manure      Dirty hands are a good sign, so hopefully, you got some mental mud on your hands and created some content to work with today.  To a starving man, any food is good food--unless it...
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This picture is from Christmas eleven years ago when Tommy was only two weeks old, and now all of them—and Gio and Pipo--are playing charades or some such game in the dining room, shouting and laughing at each other's miscues and fortifying another enduring memory...
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Last of the Boys

by | August 12, 2014 | Fires in the Belly, Songs | 0 Comments

Come on over here
and I’ll buy the next round:
cold beer and some shooters
for the boys on the town;
Darby ain’t drinkin’
so let’s live it up
‘cause he’ll drive us all home
in his company truck

Jesus Christ, Jimmy,
man you say that you’re well;
I say we drive into Boston
and stir up some hell;
put a cap on the weekend,
a stitch in the night,
watch the Pats play on Sunday
and the welterweight fight.

That’s all she wrote boys,
there ain’t any more;
that’s why we’re standing here;
that’s what it’s for.
That’s why we all go on working all day
busting our ass for short pay:
~Hey…

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New Ways

by | February 21, 2017 | Journal | 0 Comments

Time for a change. Feeling it in a lot of ways. After months of steady workouts, I’ve been finding too many convenient ways to let the day slip by. Still feel better than I have in years, but the days seem to have got the best of me. Excuses, procrastination and...
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The Late and Lazy Teacher

by | May 1, 2014 | Essays, Journal, Teaching | 0 Comments

I guess this is a good thing. I showed up five minutes late for class, and my classroom was empty. I walked the hallways of the school and could not find any of them. I sheepishly asked the assistant headmaster if he "happened to see a class of wandering boys?"No, he...
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Moby Dick: Chapters 42-51

by | March 1, 2015 | Essays, Journal, Teaching | 0 Comments

A literary reflection to my students... The lowering for whales, the appearance of Fedallah's crew, the vivid descriptions of the first chase in a sudden and unrelenting gale, the fatalistic joy of resigning oneself to fate, the awesome poetic intensity of Melville's...
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In the unfolding chores

by | July 7, 2017 | Journal, Poetry | 0 Comments

The day sometimes slip away from me, a huge pine half-bucked in the backyard, the kids old tree fort cut into slabs, a ton of coal waiting to be moved in a train of buckets to the bin. Sipping cold water on the back deck I hear Emma rustling for soccer cleats and...
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Writing Iambic Dimeter Poetry

by | February 19, 2018 | Journal, Poetry, Teaching | 0 Comments

I am sitting here realizing how hard it is to ask you--a bunch of fifteen-year-old boys--to write iambic dimeter poetry, a form of poetry that is more or less ignored nowadays. I (literally) played around for a couple of hours penning these poems, which are at least...
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The Gift Unclaimed

by | February 27, 2018 | Journal, Poetry | 0 Comments

I have an old lobster buoy Hanging dully from A wrought-iron basket hook— A rough cutaway Filled with suet, Clabbered in wire mesh. . I had imagined chickadees Squabbling with angry jays And occasional sparrows, finches— Maybe even cedar waxwings tired of scrounging...
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Creating a Digital Workflow in the Classroom

by | September 6, 2014 | Essays, Journal, Teaching | 0 Comments

One Teacher’s Solution To Everything  Years of teaching woodshop at my school has reinforced in me the utility of developing a workflow that works best for the project at hand using the tools and equipment already in the shop. The same can be said of my other life as...
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Ghetto of Your Eye

by | August 12, 2014 | Fires in the Belly, Songs | 0 Comments

I wrote this song back in the winter of 1989, in the dining car of a steam driven train, somewhere along the Trans-Siberian railway, after meeting a group of Russian soldiers fresh from battle in Afghanistan—that poor country that has been a battleground for way too long.

We stare together hours the snow whipped Russian plain—
rolling in the ghetto of your eye.
We share a quart of vodka
and some cold meat on the train—
you know too much to even wonder why;
I see it in the ghetto of your eye.

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Goathouse

by | May 23, 2014 | Poetry, Raccoon | 0 Comments

Goat house In reaching for the scythe I’m reminded of the whetstone and the few quick strokes by which it was tested-- the hardness of hot August; the burning of ticks off dog backs. It’s winter now in this garage made barn, and the animals seem only curious that I’d...
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A Late Night Metacognition

by | April 13, 2014 | Essays, Journal | 0 Comments

Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after ~Henry David Thoreau           When you need something done, find a busy person to help you get it done. My mother loved repeating that to me all the way to her dying day,...
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The Next Time Around

by | April 16, 2016 | Essays, Journal | 0 Comments

        I wonder what the years have really taught me about writing and music. I have gotten so used to preaching and teaching that I am a bit looped by the thought of writing—as in how I wrote before (or how I will claim I wrote) before settling into this somewhat...
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In Reply To Einstein

by | July 14, 2014 | Poetry, Raccoon | 0 Comments

*God casts the die, not the dice. ~Alfred Einstein I am cold down the neck, turtling my head to showers of ice that fall dancing and skidding on skins of crusted snow. I hold my breath when I step, inflating hopes of a weightlessness, and so be undetected
to the play...
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Another Wednesday

by | April 20, 2016 | Journal | 0 Comments

        It is a good night for meatballs. The same meal we have cooked every Wednesday night for thirteen years and counting. Tonight is a beautiful and warm night of vacation week, so more than likely we will have a big crowd joining us—but we never know who. The...
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Thanksgiving

by | November 28, 2013 | Journal, Poetry | 0 Comments

I am surprised sometimes by the suddenness of November: beauty abruptly shed to a common nakedness— grasses deadened by hoarfrost, persistent memories of people I’ve lost. It is left to those of us dressed in the hard barky skin of experience to insist on a decorum...
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Goathouse

by | July 12, 2014 | Poetry, Raccoon | 0 Comments

In reaching for the scythe I’m reminded of the whetstone and the few quick strokes by which it was tested— the hardness of hot August; the burning of ticks off dog backs. It’s winter now in this garage made barn, and the animals seem only curious that I’d be here so...
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The Inn

by | November 21, 2013 | Essays, Journal | 0 Comments

Every Thursday, for some thirty years, I have been spending this same time each week wrapping up the loose ends of the day before heading down to the inn to play to whomever and whatever shows up. Tonight looks like a fun night: Maroghini will be with me for his last...
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Thinking of My Sister

by | September 23, 2014 | Journal | 0 Comments

When Cool Was Really Cool  Life is not counted by the amount of breaths we take,  but of the moments that leave us breathless. ~Unknown             We were coming home from church one morning and Jimmy Glennon pulled up beside us as we approached the Sudbury road...
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China Journal: Part Two

by | July 27, 2015 | Essays, Journal, Teaching | 0 Comments

II The grass grows. The rain falls Nothing is done. Nothing is left undone ~Buddha   A day can be perfect. I have to believe this. Today was. Is. Is was a day in china. The sun breaking through today after yesterday’s typhoon. Lazy walk to the coffee shop....
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The Teacher’s Couch

by | October 11, 2014 | Essays, Journal, Teaching | 0 Comments

It’s not just a couch; it’s a sofa, too ~Fitz           I remember my first year teaching at Fenn—and it was really my first stint as a true worker with responsibilities outside of what I already had in my wheelhouse—and on this day, some twenty something years ago, I...
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The Nagging Thing

by | November 19, 2015 | Essays, Journal, Teaching | 0 Comments

Not many more nights like this, warm enough to sit outside on the back porch. The kids and Denise long asleep. Usually, during the school year, this is my "time" to catch up on schoolwork--grading, posting the assignments for the week and playing the general catchup...
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What’s in a Song

by | May 4, 2014 | Essays, Journal | 0 Comments

Every heart sings a song, incomplete, until another heart whispers back. Those who wish to sing always find a song. At the touch of a lover, everyone becomes a poet. ~Plato         Writing a song is not just an exercise in seeking some kind of future fame. It is...
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Zenmo Yang Ni

by | August 12, 2014 | Fires in the Belly, Songs | 0 Comments

I lost the time I hardly knew you,
half-assed calling:
“How you doing?
Laughing at my hanging hay field;
I never knew the time
that tomorrow’d bring,
until it brung to me.

Yuan lai jui shuo: “Zenmoyang ni?”
Xianzai chang shu: “Dou hai keyi”;
Xiexie nimen, dou hen shang ni.
Xiwang wo men dou hen leyi
Dou hen leyi

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Searching for an Alibi

by | August 12, 2014 | Fires in the Belly, Songs | 0 Comments

Here I am out on the road again
and it feels longer than it was back then;
when I was younger, man, it saw me through—
now it don’t do
what I want it to—

Too ra loo ra loo ra lady I—
I’m just out searching for an alibi
Too ra loo ra loo ra lady I
I’m just out searching for an alibi.

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Dallas: 7/7/2016

by | July 8, 2016 | Journal | 0 Comments

I woke up this morning almost too fearful to read the news. I stayed up late into the night just watching for the breaking stories and updates. Now, I am simplyconfused about how to act. I feel incredibly small and pointless, unsure of where I stand and how to move...
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How do I know

by | July 8, 2017 | Journal, Poetry | 0 Comments

what I know? The sharp angles of this simple cottage perfected in every board sawn, shingle split and beam hewn into place goes together placed, splined, slid together, bound more by intuition than knowing.
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Ready. Set. Go.

by | April 7, 2014 | Essays, Journal, Teaching | 0 Comments

Who forgets to rinse his hair? Me, I guess, for that was the start of my day. I smelled something like coconut oil on my way to school, and then I realized, dang, my hair is still pretty wet. Wet with hair conditioner. And then I get sot school all coconutty smelling...
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