Old Buzzard Face

November 15, 2009 @ birchtree →

Pour me ‘nother shot o’ that gulpin’ whiskey, boy

(Jeez, reckon I tasted better lickin’ the spit off an Injun’s headdress)

And I’ll bet you the feathers off a ‘coondog’s back this

Next little tale’ll curl your gizzard and give you

Chinese Chin fo’ week, for sure.

Well, as I calc’late, it wuz Josiah, Fredricks and m’self,

We’d been up at Owl Creek at least a tenday

Pannin’ for sugarcubes like the Devil himself wuz gonna

Come riding through any time and inform our little posse

That he takes five lumps and no milk in his Arbuckle’s,

And bring him one of them there scones fer cryin’ out loud,

Ain’t any of you heard of hospitality gone nab it?

– When ol’ Fredricks spins us some yarn ‘bout

‘Needin’ t’adjust this darn cummerbund’

And heads on up into the woods quicker’n dirt.

Well, that wuz about the last thing he ever did

And do I give a blocked trombone?

Do I hellebores. He had it comin’. Only at that time

What we didn’t full realise wuz

We all had it comin’.

Hey! This bottle’s faulty. Bring me another

Or I’m carvin’ on this here table that

Your mother hunted crabs off Bald Man’s point.

If Destroyed Still True, y’hear me?

So anyways, reckon ‘bout an hour’s passed afore

One of us gets to wondering jus’

Where Fredricks had gotten himself.

Seems like it wuz Josiah, though it may a been me,

Can’t rightly say,

Well one of us heads on into the treeline

(And it’s a steep walk outta the creek bed let me tell you.)

Daylight’s gettin’ saggy and there’s

Not a dry wisp of Fredricks to be seen,

But overhead there’s this

big ol’ black buzzard squawking like

He caught lead up his third eye,

‘Raaaak! Raaaak!’ All the dang while,

drive a fella crazy it would.

Mayhaps it did.

Whiskey, God damn you boy, bring it to me!

Pour it into my gaping mouth,

Splash it over my knees you little turkey baiter,

Fill my pockets up and let it seep into my longjohns!

Sun’s down now, just me, Josie, and the shadows,

And that dang buzzard,

‘Raaak! Raaak!’ All the while, see.

Well by this time I was just so aroused I couldn’t stand it no more

So I jus’ played along good and proper,

Screeching along with that ol’ buzzard,

Firing my pistol off into the night,

(I even threw a little dance in there too)

When it all goes quiet, quiet like someone

Stuck my head in a spittoon and closed the lid.

Then outta the night comes Fredricks,

Only he don’t look too well,

All this hair growing out of his upper lip

And lookin’ at me funny,

Saying he got lost and scared and all the rest of it,

And who the heck shot Josiah?

So I do the only thing a Christian could do in that there situation,

And put him out of his misery.

A couple o’ bullets and he’s tucked in nice and tight,

The creek water lappin’ on him like a faithful hound.

Anyhoo, you’d not get me back up there for all the tamborines in Texas.

I musta moseyed my way back into town lookin’ quite a sight with that

Dead buzzard’s beak strapped to my face,

But that’s what it takes an’ I ain’t ashamed o’that.

Hey now, more o’that sippin’ liquor! Rub it into my scalp,

That’s my girl,

Make sure to get it behind the ears there,

Oh sweet Delilah’s dumplings…