Tuesday, December 16, 2008

An Inexpensive Christmas Gift Idea

Old Man Sam Ward’s History of the Gee-Haw Whimmy-Diddle

some folks say
the injuns made ‘em
like lie-detectors
called ‘em
hoo-doo sticks

feller
in Salisbury, Noth Caylini
made the first
whimmy-diddle I seen

I whittle seven
kind: thisuns king
size, thisuns jumbo, thisuns
extry large

here’s a single, here’s one
double, here’s a triple and why right here
here’s a forked ‘un

been whittlin’ whimmy-diddles come
ten year, I reckon you’d
care to see my other toys,
boys, I got some fine
flipper-dingers, fly-
killers and bug-roarers, I can

kill a big fly at 60 feet

watch here

Jonathan Williams (Asheville, North Carolina, 1929 - )

1 comment:

jackscrow said...

I had heard of Blackmountain College, of course, but until I started backtracking your subject here, I hadn't quite realized the impact it had on the poetry and arts scene.

When I went to the bmcproject page, I was struck by the amount of historic info and also the collection of photographs, and in particular, the pictures of the weaving room and young girls weaving. Reminds me of Penland, although Penland is more "craft" oriented.

It's wonderful when something strikes enough to prompt even shallow research, and your posts often result in me learning things I never would have otherwise.

Thanks.


http://www.bmcproject.org/index.htm

http://www.blackmountaincollege.org/

http://www.penland.org/