As he grew to the age
of accountability
a lanky boy listened
to old men
tell tales
of the lovely Polly McGaha.
The night they drug her
down the steps
Polly pulled the squirrel skin
off one rider's face.
"Decatur," Polly cried
in disbelief.
"I knowed you since
you were a chap.
Decatur!"
Jim McGaha smelt
the flesh of horse
as he ran past the
open cabin door.
He lifted his young bride
now maimed and spent
upon the cabin floor
and wailed,
"I am a Republican,
"I am a Republican."
Two days later
with shot and murder
blown into Decatur's
sinewy chest,
McGaha's rage became
the local legend's ghost.
There was no
mystery to the death.
And in a rule of
frenzy in the south,
more than two hundred
names were
scribbled down.
To right the lore,
local historians twisted
the spilling to
a feud among
cherry bounce distillers.
But those who saw a
neighbor
bleed three months
past into the dirt
knew the truth.
The abuse of Polly
was the first,
and she who
never smiled again
would later
smother under cover
in Clark's old wagon
traveling lone
across the Tennessee hills
where her avenger,
lover, husband, and friend
felled green logs in wait.
Scupper © 2/2010
a reference of sorts:
p. 108/1872
http://books.google.com/books?id=saYFAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA498&dq=decatur+depriest&cd=2#v=onepage&q=decatur%20depriest&f=false
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Ashley Holt
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Comments
now i want to hear gill scott heron sing it