An early draft of a poem by Kenneth Oliphant, in pencil.
"The Ballad of Billy Branagan Pt. 1"
Billy done drunk four bottles of wine. / Billy chops chickens,
And throttles his swine. / Liquored-up and bloody after choking
A hog, / Billy got drunker yet and danced with his dog. / Billy
Loves Debbie and he calls her a whore. / Billy knows goddamwell
How Deborah is sore. / He dances with the dog, and he goes to the store.
He returns with bloody tires and then hands her a rose. / Swiftly
Into romance mode, Billy then goes. / He gives her a kiss
And sniffs crack off her tit. / He chokes another hog
And gives his woman a hit. / Then they do the rest off of
The microwave tray, / and fuck each other senseless for
The rest of the day. / Dawn closes in on Billy and Deb.
Another lonely night covers them like a web / woven by
The spider of God and Time. / They never needed reason,
Hardly ever a rhyme.
Broken by the light of the very next day, / Billy breaks Debbie
And they sputter away, / down in the truck to the pontoon bridge,
To fish, as a sort of bumpkin sortilege. / What the fish tell them
Don’t amount to much. / It’s clear that they live within the
Spidery clutch / of that immortal insect who imposes his rules
Down upon the countryside of temporal fools. / And further
Down the valley people bound to the hide / surround the
Ghetto where old Deb and Billy reside, / counting out their teeth
As they do their friends, / and wishing they had more of both,
Each country heart rends / or clefts in twain, as the spider’s
Heavenly bod, / visions of their children as irascible gods.
So Billy’s little child, soon as he was born, / became a
Little king with an uncircumcised horn / played in a series of
Of golden streams / upon the carpet, grass, the porch, and
Into the dreams / of his coked-out mother who considered
Him blessed / enough that he never really need be dressed; / for
As she claimed, he never once was bit by a pest, / and all
Those tiny welts were headless pimples at best.
Then they woke one day to find the child drowned, / his head
Down in a bucket of a bleach compound. / They wailed and they cried
And they questioned the sky / as to why the spider needed Tanner to
Die. / A spider has no reason to eat such a small fly. / Because of
Tanner, Billy saw the spider had lied. / He plodded down the aisle
To make Debbie his bride. / Debbie married him and they shot-guns
In the air, / to lend some country meaning to the ugly affair. / Later in
The month, Billy got loaded again, / and wrestled in the hay
With Debbie’s only good friend. / He told her she had eyes
Reminding him of his boy, / and bit her when he kissed her,
Loving her like a toy / deep within the clutch of an incorrigible
Boy. / They say that Billy died while beseeching a coy, / But
It likely was a catfish that he weighed using troy.
Billy done drunk four bottles of wine. / Billy chops chickens,
And throttles his swine. / Liquored-up and bloody after choking
A hog, / Billy got drunker yet and danced with his dog. / Billy
Loves Debbie and he calls her a whore. / Billy knows goddamwell
How Deborah is sore. / He dances with the dog, and he goes to the store.
He returns with bloody tires and then hands her a rose. / Swiftly
Into romance mode, Billy then goes. / He gives her a kiss
And sniffs crack off her tit. / He chokes another hog
And gives his woman a hit. / Then they do the rest off of
The microwave tray, / and fuck each other senseless for
The rest of the day. / Dawn closes in on Billy and Deb.
Another lonely night covers them like a web / woven by
The spider of God and Time. / They never needed reason,
Hardly ever a rhyme.
Broken by the light of the very next day, / Billy breaks Debbie
And they sputter away, / down in the truck to the pontoon bridge,
To fish, as a sort of bumpkin sortilege. / What the fish tell them
Don’t amount to much. / It’s clear that they live within the
Spidery clutch / of that immortal insect who imposes his rules
Down upon the countryside of temporal fools. / And further
Down the valley people bound to the hide / surround the
Ghetto where old Deb and Billy reside, / counting out their teeth
As they do their friends, / and wishing they had more of both,
Each country heart rends / or clefts in twain, as the spider’s
Heavenly bod, / visions of their children as irascible gods.
So Billy’s little child, soon as he was born, / became a
Little king with an uncircumcised horn / played in a series of
Of golden streams / upon the carpet, grass, the porch, and
Into the dreams / of his coked-out mother who considered
Him blessed / enough that he never really need be dressed; / for
As she claimed, he never once was bit by a pest, / and all
Those tiny welts were headless pimples at best.
Then they woke one day to find the child drowned, / his head
Down in a bucket of a bleach compound. / They wailed and they cried
And they questioned the sky / as to why the spider needed Tanner to
Die. / A spider has no reason to eat such a small fly. / Because of
Tanner, Billy saw the spider had lied. / He plodded down the aisle
To make Debbie his bride. / Debbie married him and they shot-guns
In the air, / to lend some country meaning to the ugly affair. / Later in
The month, Billy got loaded again, / and wrestled in the hay
With Debbie’s only good friend. / He told her she had eyes
Reminding him of his boy, / and bit her when he kissed her,
Loving her like a toy / deep within the clutch of an incorrigible
Boy. / They say that Billy died while beseeching a coy, / But
It likely was a catfish that he weighed using troy.