Captain Billy's Whiz Bang, Vol. 3, No. 25, October, 1921 / America's Magazine of Wit, Humor and Filosophy

Smokehouse Poetry

In the November issue Smokehouse Poetry will bring back to memory that Civil War classic, “Your Letter, Lady, Came Too Late.” This beautiful and touching poem was written by an officer of the Confederate Army to the most beautiful and brilliant belle of Savannah, the fiancee of the officer’s companion in prison. The woman had written a cold, heartless letter, but her fiance had died before the letter was received and the poem was in answer to it.

Tonight your home may shine with lights,

And ring with merry songs,

And you be smiling as though your soul

Had done no deathly wrong.

Your hands so fair, none would think

Had penned these words of pain,

Your skin so white, would God, your heart,

Were half so free from stain.

In addition to this noted classic, Whiz Bang will reproduce “Down In the Lehigh Valley,” which is well known by name among Smokehouse fans. And, in parting, folks, don’t forget that the Winter Annual will contain the greatest assortment of Smokehouse poetry ever put into print. Send your dollar in before you are too late.

* * *

The Prisoner’s Prayer

This poem was written by Arthur Winter on the wall of the Federal Prison at McNeil Island, Washington, in September, 1909, and later memorized by another prisoner and forwarded to the Whiz Bang upon his release. We offer it to you for what you think it is worth.

Our prayer has gone up through the ages

To a God whom they say gave us souls;

But the fear of anger still rages,

The thunder of punishment rolls.

We are sheep that are driven to slaughter;

We are dogs that are whelped in the street;

We are useless as poisonous water;

We are only for punishment meet.

So hear ye the prayers from the prison,

Where fever and famine are rife;

Where never one soul has arisen,

Where myriads go down in the strife.

Where the black wing of death scarcely hovers,

Lest its jesters should make him unclean;

And the soft fleecy clouds hurry over,

To shut out God’s sun from the scene.

Where the light of God’s orb would be stricken,

With shame as it passed in the sky,

To look in the cells where we sicken,

To fall in the sod where we die.

If thou, God, omnipotent being,

Can pierce the prison’s pale gloom;

And growest not sick of the seeing,

This charnel, this foul-reeking tomb?

If Thy hand stretch not forth in its anger,

To smite this damn den of despair,

Whose evil is rampant, and languor

Is lord of the poisonous lair.

Then God, take Ye back your creation,

And plunge it in infinite fire,

Your wrath is eternal damnation,

But man’s is more lasting dire.

* * *

The Sunflower Kid

By Koffdrop DeHaven.

A few years back, in my palmy days, when the boxing game was grand,

I tipped the scales at a hundred and ten; had a punch in either hand;

But I never was a top notch, the reason for which I’ll tell,

I was learning a trade in a boiler shop; I worked, and worked like everything;

I was down at the gym three times a week, tore off six rounds each night,

’Till I found myself in tiptop shape and ready for the fight.

I was matched to box “The Sunflower Kid,” the colored bantam champ;

I knew he was good so I trained down fine, and stuck to my training camp.

For I never drank nor smoked then, boys, I prided my health and strength,

Could box like Gibbons and hit like Jack, had a good left jab for its length.

The fight with the “chocolate drop” was at the Chickatawbut club;

Although I was white I was in the dark for they took me for a dub.

We entered the ring and a whoop went up, we both shared the applause,

They liked us both and “The Kid” was a price and we knew each other’s flaws.

For we went to school together, “The Sunflower Kid” and me,

And we knew each other’s tactics like the saying A to Z.

The bell rang; we came to the front and neither of us smiled,

We were feinting and “feeling each other out,” and one of my swings went wild;

No damage was done in the opening round, except for a few left hooks,

I was sure I had his number then and proceeded to mar his looks.

The eighth opened up, I was still very fresh, getting stronger all the while,

I ducked “The Kid’s” right swing to the jaw and met him with a smile,

Yes, a smile and also a right hand smash to the softest part of the jaw,

And “The Kid” went down from the force of the blow and laid out on the straw.

The referee counted ten and then the “Kid” didn’t move a bit,

I knelt beside him, got hold of his head, I knew he was hard hit.

A doctor jumped in and felt his pulse, put water on his head,

A minute later he tested his heart and announced the “Kid” was dead.

From that time on, I’m sorry to say, my life began to fail

In health and strength and happiness for I served ten years in jail.

And now I am fighting Barleycorn and my hair is turning gray,

And I’ll beget this tough old gamester until my judgment day.

* * *

Not Me

When a pretty Fairy gets on a car,

And her dress comes kinder high,

The goodly man will steal a glance,

Even as you and I.

But when he’s with a real nice girl,

To look, he will not try,

He is a regular “model man”

Even as you and I.

* * *

Evolution

Jazzed a trifle—Apologies to Langdon Smith

By Neil McConlogue.

When you were part of an elephant’s tusk

In the Palezoic time,

And I rode round in a walrus mouth

’Mid the piscatorial slime,

Or skittered with many a caudal flip

Thru the depths of a salmon fen—

Our hearts were rife with that dentine life,

But—I wasn’t with you then.

That was before the colored man

Invented the game called Crap;

Before they cubed and spotted our sides,

And tossed us toward Fortune’s Lap.

But the world turned on in the lathe of time;

The hot sands heaved amain;

And our faces were polished with emery wheel—

Then between us they made a game.

At first they called us a “game of dice.”

We were drab as a dead man’s hand:

We lolled at ease ’neath the dripping trees,

Or trailed thru the mud and sand.

Sextette-sided, with corners round,

Writing a language dumb;

While fingers snapped and cash exchanged

On bets that we wouldn’t “come.”

Later they labeled us “African Golf.”

And they gave us a spin once more.

Our forms were rolled in the clinging mold

Of the Terra Firma shore.

The aeons came, and the aeons fled,

But the hand that held us fast,

Was sure to hold us a bit too long,

We tried hard, but—couldn’t “pass.”

Then light and swift thru the jungle trees

Swung the white men in their flights;

And they heard the darkies plead “Come little Joe”!

In the hush of policeless nights.

And, Oh! What improvement the white man made!

For us there were no bounds!

We were riven away by a newer day,

And no longer rolled on the ground.

Thus point by point, and “pass” by “pass,”

Onward thru cycles strange,

We “sevened,” “elevened,” “nined,” and “fived,”

And followed the chain of change;

’Till there came a time in Gambledom

’Midst many a weal and woe—

They changed the name of this plucky game

To “Bounding Domino.”

Long were the “rolls” on the table-top.

When the game would once begin;

Longer the howls of the “folks-of-chance”

When “hard-luck” came trooping in.

O’er gold, and silver, and paper notes,

They’d fight, and claw, and tear;

And cheek by jowl—with words quite foul

They’d soil the clothes they’d wear.

We were discovered so long ago

In a time that no man knows;

Yet here tonight, in the mellow light,

Near the race-track at Pamlico,

Our eyes are dotted with half-carat stones

That shine like the Devon Springs;

And cute Flappers display us in public

Quite as proudly as diamond rings.

It makes no difference if we are rolled

For a dollar, five, or ten.

Our love is cold, our game is old,

And the “sucker” our kith and kin.

Tho cities have sprung above the graves

Where the crook-boned-men made war,

Let us drink anew to the time when you

Found the hardest point was “Four.”

Moral:

REMEMBER, He who operates a barber-shop is not barbaric; He that studies the lunar system is not a lunatic; He who exists on a stew is not always a student; He who thinks that One Broadway makes New York has “muchly” to learn; And—He that caresseth the Uneasy Ivories is hastily disconnected from his dough.

Never Shoot Crap!

Never! Remember That!

TOTAL MORAL: Play Poker Instead!

* * *

Is it you I love dear?

I can scarcely tell.

When you smile your eyes, dear,

Make me think of Nell.

When you’re sad, your mouth, dear,

Makes me think of Sue,

But, dear, when I kiss you,

I am sure it’s you.

* * *

Oh! You City Slickers

By Gordon Campbell.

’Twas down in the Lehigh Valley

That me and my pal, Lou,

Was workin’ in a hash house,

An’ a pretty good one too.

It was there that I met Gonzola;

She was the village belle,

Now I was only a waiter,

But I loved that gal like everything.

Then along come a city feller,

A slick haired son of the idle,

An’ stole my darling little Lou

To slip on the marriage bridle.

So fill up the glasses, stranger,

An’ I’ll be on my way;

I’ll get the guy that stole my gal,

If it takes till the judgment day.

* * *

Our Paris Letter

A Jack Johnson burst over the shell hole into which Pat and Mike had crawled. “Oi’ve been shot in the foot,” said Pat. Mike immediately placed Pat on his shoulder and started for the hospital. On his way there another shell took off Pat’s head. Arriving at the first aid station, the sentry hailed Mike.

“No use bringing any dead men in here,” he said. “That fellow’s head has been shot off.”

“Why, the son-of-a-gun,” exclaimed Mike, “he told me it was his foot.”

* * *

Oh, Pickle My Bones

Pat—“Well, Mike, I just saw a doctor about my loss of memory.”

Mike—“What did he do?”

Pat—“He made me pay in advance.”

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