Synopses & Reviews
Bobby Joeif i should die before I wake...
I don't know if I believed in ghosts
before Bobby Joe Lee had his stroke
that big man we called Bull lying there
all them years in that hospital room
wasn't nothing they could do
but wait and see
if he'd try to wake up or let it go
he was like a lightning-struck tree
didn't even know it was gone
alone in there, blind and lost
until the next firestorm come
to finish him off
The PBS-TV documentary on David Lee was entitled "The Pig Poet," and according to The Denver Post that sobriquet didn't bother Utah's poet Laureate: "I've rarely in my life been without a pig." Pigs, and the gentle-hearted redneck roustabout John, feature prominently in Lee's narratives and are integral to what he calls his "aural agrarian saga." This saga, written over the past two decades, is also populated with some of the most authentically drawn characters since those of Mark Twain. Lee's small-town universe is frequented by tragedy and near-tragedy, and transcendence most often arrives in the form of salvaged humor, whether ironic, self-depricating, or ribald.
"David Lee's pig poems are the best thing to happen to animals in poetry since Kit Smart's cat.'-Thomas McGrath
"Lee's calculatedly simple narratives are wonderfully wrought. His is a welcome voice, neither academic nor urban."-Booklist
Also available by David Lee
David Lee: A Listener's Guide Reading from: A Legacy of Shadows and News from Down to the CaféAudio CD $12.00, 1-55659-137-3.
Synopsis
Irresistably accessible "Pig Poet"--and subject of PBS documentary--is half preacher, half farmer, half genius.
Synopsis
Poems. Taking great care to elucidate the ordinary lives of rural Americans, David Lee's selected poems contain the famous pig poems which led a PBS-TV documentary to brand him The Pig Poet. Yet pigs are only part of the story. They join with folks like the gentle-hearted, redneck roustabout John Sims, or Elis Britton, the meanest man in the world, as cast members of Lee's aural agrarian saga. Lee is the Poet Laureate of Utah.
About the Author
David Lee, author of eight books of poetry, was Utah's first Poet Laureate. A former seminary candidate, semi-pro baseball player, and hog farmer, he has a Ph.D. with a concentration in Milton and is the recently retired head of the Languages and Literature department at Southern Utah University.
Table of Contents
The porcine legacy -- Loading boar -- Behold -- Jubilate Agno, 1975 -- Salvage grain -- The pig hunt -- The tale of the graveblaster -- Racehogs -- Plowing -- For Jan, with love -- Kolob at evening -- Nighthunting with John -- Fall -- Jan's birthday -- Day of mourning, 24 November '75 -- Dusk -- Driving and drinking -- North to Parowan Gap -- East to Paragonah -- Back to the valley -- The porcine canticles -- Barbed wire -- The hay swather -- Tuesday morning, loading pigs -- Tuesday morning, driving to the auction in Salina -- The chain letter (an American tragedy) -- The muffler and the law -- Culture -- The real estate -- Mean -- Friday afternoon, feeding pigs -- Building farrowing pen -- The farm -- Aftermath -- Baalam -- Epilogue -- Day's work -- Morning -- After an all-night farrow -- Sonnet the sun, rising -- Phone call -- January: unloading feed -- Fence repair -- Faith tittle -- Building pigpens -- Coyote dope -- The tree -- Feeding -- Fat -- Arthritis -- Sep