These past few days I been thankin an’ thankin bout a late summer night I tried a long time to fergit. I’s a-settin here a-thankin an’ a-writin an’ soon enuff you like’ta realize that everthang I’s a-thankin an’ a-writin . . . naw it’s these
voices, man . . . it’s these chaintooth voices, way down inside this ol’ wore-out metal warsh-tub noggin o’ mine, it’s them whut’s talkin an’ talkin, churnin an’ rattlin, on an’ on they go.
But okey. It’s okey.
Man, I tell ye whut . . . this here rotted-out man-husk I still believe has got to be me . . . yessir, still, even after they got him to take a journey jaunt down to the unnerworld fer to begin agin . . . an’ so down he goed an’ they seated him to a desk an’ they put him to work sharpnin pencils an’ shreddin paper an’ fiddlin wi’ the coffeepot . . . man, I tell ye, he done learn’d he better breathe slow, nice an’ slow, an’ he ain’t too hard to please an’ if you was to call upon yer goodwill e’er so little it might just be possable to portray him as a ordnary ol’ barn gnome, native to Hadeland, Gran, an’ all.
Might. It might just be possable. An’ ye’ll call upon that goodwill, won’t ye?
Yessir. He’ll be fine, that gnome. He can keep on pretendin, actin
the optimist, tho’ he’d sooner hear tell when he might git to see calm daylight agin.
Light. Just a jag of light. Just one sliverin skiver of light, but still a trusty courier from the sun whut heaves an’ swells fer many a lively night-wrangler over an’ above that hill in the east, a-heavin an’ a-swellin an’ chasin them satanical shadows you says you remember too, them shadows swingin round an’ round in a tralalalala trollin hoe-down, once upon a time in the year nineteen-eighty-and-thereabouts, one forestclad late summer night?
An’ mightn’t there have been one you’d allow you done seen before? One o’ them satanical shadows in pertic’lar?
Okey. He’d a-been right pleas’d with a little daylight, that there man-husk. An’ that sun, she chas’d away them cadgy unnerworldly fellers . . . but that there meckanickal barn gnome, boy . . . he can spook around up here in the daylight jest as well.
Meckanickal? Meckanickal barn gnome?
Durn straight. If that ain’t a ittybitty deetail. About that there feller I still believe must be me . . . he is an’ always has been meckanickal, just a fairly ordnary meckanickal barn gnome. Cables, connectors, fuses, plugs, screws, an’ nuts. Push-puppet man. A stop-moshun push-puppet gnome-doll man, right outta Ivo Caprino. An’ a ol’ metal warsh-tub where ye ought ta’ve found a gnome-noggin on yer usual dimestore dollie.
Remote-controll’d? Nuh-uh, boy. This here model’s one o’ them self-operatin types, accordin to the manual. An’ that late summer night? Well, he just up an’ operated his own self an’ he was a nimble lil’ booger too considerin he’s a meckanickal barn gnome an’ all. But now? Now he’s all rotted out. Plum rotted out. Naw, he ain’t much good no more, an’ dadgum if it don’t hurt him a right smart to go runnin around operatin hisself sometimes.
An’ these voices. They’s a-talkin an’ a-talkin, sayin: Naw, start all over agin? No-ho-hooo boy. Done to a fare-thee-well. Done.
Listen to him. Listen to him. Listen to how talkified he is all of a sudden . . .
We tried gittin him to talk too. But talk to us? Durn’d if he won’t.
Bout two-three days ago last we tried. Tractor putterin about. Wheat stalks a-bulgin. An’ a chaintooth voice tolt us to skeer him real good. We diked ourselves out good, boy. This one feller, he put on one o’ them gashly-lookin yulegoat masks ya gotta yank down over yer mug to put on, just like them factory-stitch ski-masks. Then we toddl’d on over. Masks an’ overcoats an’ boots . . . An’ it turn’d hot out. The daydown-sun, she’s havin herself a good ol’ time. Daydown-sun . . . sun . . . Ha ha. Better not make no menshun o’ her, ah? Anyhow . . . We git right down unner the feller’s kitchen wender an’ set ourselves to howlin an’ hollerin like a bunch o’ wolves who cain’t hardly hold in the howlin no more. Naw, hold it in? Hold it in all the way till the moon come out? We stood there a-howlin. Tractor putterin off yonder, ye could hear it putt-putt-puttin away in betwixt all the howlin. But they wutn’t nary a sound comin outta his house. An’ the daydown-sun . . . sun . . . ha ha. Light. Just a jag of light . . .
Talkin? I tell ye I heard plenty o’ talkin. In the way-back-when. Past few days, too, natcherly. These past few days in the unnerworld.
They. They was talkin an’ talkin, churnin an’ rattlin, on an’ on they goed. They.
Ain’t no matter.
Cause it was the Dead Feller, ye see, it was that there Dead Feller
sangin . . . Sangin. Not talkin.
The Dead Feller’? The cloudcuckoo. The cloudcuckoo coo-coo-cooin, they said.
Nuh-uh, buddy. Wutn’t no cuckoo. Wutn’t no nightowl, nuther.
Dead Feller. That was the Dead Feller, sangin.
Dead Feller Dead Feller Dead Feller.
Down in the Mare Cooter Canyon that late summer night. Down in the overgrow’d Mare Cooter Canyon o’er by the Lunnerworld. It was there the meckanickal barn gnome finally heard the Dead Feller sangin. Fust, he heard the cows an’ the cow concert an’ then the Dead Feller hisself, boy . . .
O the girlie, the girlie, she went out a-walkin’ An’ the foxie, the foxie, in wait was a-stalkin . . .
More. More to come, I tell ye’. More. As ‘twere woven in an’ out o’ this here norration, this tellin from a time they says is over an’ done with an’ that’s why they call it the way-back-when.
The way-back-when. Over an’ out. Them voices in the warsh-tub noggin says so. An’ the menfolks down here in the unnerworld, they say so too, th’ whole herd o’ suit-wairin, fine-smellin, buff’d-up men-folks. They says the same thang as all them swaggerin pissants, them swaggerin pissants way up yonder, on the surface. Up there an’ down here, everbody says the way-back-when is over an’ done with. Up there an’ down here is all kinda folks tellin an’ declamatin how it is. Just a-cucklin an’ a-bleatin an’ a-tellin us drasted souls whut to thank about this an’ about that. Politics, money, religion. We got to thank whut they says we best be thankin an’ whut we best be believin cause ain’t nuthin but the best is the best. Natcherly. Ain’t no reason at’oll fer no misdoubtin, hem-hawin, stutterin, or stammerin. The politics it runs in their veins an’ if they was to be empty’d o’ blood why then it’d run out into the tunnels dug unnerneath
by meathungry worms but anyhow: politicians they is, natcheral politicians. Ain’t no matter if the one’s still a-livin an’ the other stone dead. If you’s a suit-wairin, fine-smellin, buff’d-up manfolk
. . . naw, ain’t no matter . . . aliv’d or dead . . . either way there’ll be a theatrickal performance. An’ money, man, the money it comes a-squirtin from outta their rear ends, they know exactly whut they got to do if they’s wantin to git their guts an’ the whole dadgum system inside o’ theirselves a-crankin, them swaggerin pissants on the surface an’ suit-wairin fellers down here in the unnerworld, just a-squirtin an’ a-squirtin, up there an’ down here they’s just a-squirtin an’ a-squirtin an’ they’s goozlin coffee an’ squirtin gulpin consumin an’ openin their mouths wide fer to be feedin on their own dewkie cause if they’s able to eat money why they’s able to crap money too, boy, if ye was wantin to go crappin then ye best be eatin an’ ye best be drankin yer coffee barefoot both before an’ after ye eat an’ so I’s a-thankin bout that late summer night an’ I already done menshun’d them cows an’ the concert they was havin . . . cows . . . poor ol’ thangs
. . . them cows who slid down the slopes smack dab into the Mare
Cooter Canyon . . . slidin . . . bout four or five of ‘em . . . each an’ ever’ one of ‘em got their guts an’ all a-crankin . . . but poor thangs
. . . poor thangs. An’ religion, man, religion . . .
The lady. The lady who was settin in the one recliner in my livin room back home . . .
She set an’ set. That whole evenin. That whole night. My last evenin, the last night up on the surface . . .
She set there, sayin:
We need ritcherals. We need religion.
We? She say that? We?
She sure did.
That lady.
Money is religion an’ religion is politics. A snip an’ a snap an’ a trippytriptrap.
It ain’t a hunnerd percent whut she said. But anyways . . .
More. As ‘twere woven in an’ out. Mmhmm. Like as not ye’ll git to hear the song, too. Song o’ the Dead Feller. A right woeful ballit, down in the Mare Cooter Canyon that late summer night.
Yessir. You, too.
Or is it a song you still, after all these years . . . a song you still have inside ye somewhereabouts? You too? Just as much as I do?
Say whut, now?
I mean: Whut is it you’s sayin you remember? Huh?
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From The Calf by Leif Høghaug, translated by David M. Smith. Used with permission of the publisher, Deep Vellum Publishing. Copyright © 2025.
