It is a dark and stormy night and so a perfect night for another installation of My Granddaddy’s Words. From what I can tell of my grandfather’s writing style, he wrote under different pseudonyms and personalities. He had a rough and tough guy he nicknamed Big Red who wrote his bad ass, take no shit prose. These poems I suspect he wrote during the late 60s or early 70s just by the tone and imagery in the writing. It seems perfect for that time frame. When contemporary coolness was evolving, and black power was emerging in America. It has a black panther, blacksploitation type of melody. I can only imagine where he was physically and mentally as he was laying down these words. Was it winter, spring, summer, or fall? Was it early morning or during the day, early evening or middle of the night when these words came to him? His poems are in three binders and meticulously written in colored inks: red, blue, green, orange, black, all alternating amongst the colors on the page. It must have taken a long time to write and rewrite his poetry in cursive, with wonderful penmanship. This piece I selected talks about a fight that Big Red is waging. Not sure who started the fight; like the song, we didn’t start the fire, it’s been churning since the world’s been turning. But according to Big Red, it’s the Last Fight…whatever that means. And now,”Red’s Last Fight.”
They came to see him do battle, friends and foes galore,
Came to see him in battle, well that’s what they’d get he swore,
Laugh and the world laughs with you, cry and you cry alone,
Looks like a good day for dying, but I ain’t gonna die unknown.
Well I had a damn good breakfast, pretty fair supper too,
it’s time now and I’m ready, come on, do what you gotta do,
Everyone wants to go to heaven, no one wants to die to get there
But I’m taking some company, ‘fore they put my ass in the chair.
They may be armed with shackles, and come three or four or more,
But the first one is a dead, dead ass, when he steps in that door.
Hope it ain’t the chaplain, he’s been pretty straight you see,
If so I hope he truly believes, the stories he’s told me.
‘Bout a land of milk and honey, where it’s your beginning not your end,
And I don’t have to worry none, cause I’m going to meet a friend.
No, I hope it ain’t the chaplain, because I’m pretty fond of him,
But I’d sure put his lights out, before he could say Amen.
Well I hear some footsteps coming, I just gotta grin,
Hope anyone comes in here, has notified their next of kin.
Yes it’s the old old story, what goes around comes around,
So let me roll my sleeves up, it’s time for getting down.
Yes, they came to see him do battle, people by the score,
Come to see him do battle, well that’s what they’d get he swore.
Laugh and the world laughs with you, cry and you cry alone
Looks like a good day for dying, but brother, I ain’t gonna die unknown
“Big Red”
Words by Reuben McCrary
Leave a Reply