GOING DOWN ON MOSES

PERCIVAL BROWNLY

_____________________

Young Mandingo Stud

“Percavil Brownly 26yr Old.
cleark @ Bookepper. bought
from N. B. Forest at Cold Water
3 Mar 1856 $265. dolars.”
—William Faulkner,
Go Down, Moses

A slender young black—
Very shy & withdrawing
Percival Brownly.

Uncle Buck saw him—
Yes, it was love at first sight.
Forest had been right.

Young black Adonis—
A Big Easy Pretty Boy
Beautiful male.

Couldn’t read or write—
Couldn’t pick cotton either.
What else could he do?

Uncle Buck’s Boyfriend

“5 mar 1856 No bookepper
any way Cant read. Can
write his Name, but I already
put that down My self Says
he can Plough but dont look l
ike it to Me. sent to Feild
to day Mar 5 1856”
—William Faulkner,
Go Down, Moses

Percival Brownly—
Only slave Buck had ever
Bought in his whole life.

Uncle Buddy was—
Extremely jealous of course
The Twins were married.

After L.Q.C. died—
They let all the slaves live in
The Plantation home.

The huge old Mansion—
Antebellum Delta dump
Rotting sad ruins.

Uncle Buck & Uncle Buddy

"long since past
any oral intercourse"
—William Faulkner,
Go Down, Moses

A married couple—
Antebellum man and wife
Like Rhett and Scarlett.

Buddy was the cook—
As well as the housekeeper
She was the bottom.

Sitting by the fire—
Rocking in her rocking chair
As she cooked dinner.

Uncle Buddy prim—
Once she was kinda pretty
Those days were long gone.

Good in Bed

“6 Mar 1856 Cant plough
either Says he aims to be.
a Precher so may be he
can lead live stock to
Crick to Drink”
—William Faulkner,
Go Down, Moses

Percival Brownly—
He can’t plow or pick cotton
Can’t read or write none.

Aint no bookkeeper—
Although he can sign his name
Can’t really blame him.

They don’t go to school—
We don’t let them read or write
Percival’s the same.

Uncle Buck knows why—
He brought Percival back then
Cause he’s good in bed.

No Preacher Either

“Mar 23th 1856 Cant do
that either Except one at
a Time Get shut of him”
—William Faulkner,
Go Down, Moses

Buddy’s just jealous—
After all these many years
The Twins as Lovers.

Kinda like Bad Seed—
It runs Evil thru the Tree
Forbidden Fruit.

The McCaslin roots—
Its twisted Family Tree
Gnarled Mississippi.

Lucius Quintus—
And handsome young Thucydus
Mulatto brother.

Dispossessed Delta Bourbons

“Dispossessed.
Not impotent:
He didn’t condone;
Not blind, because
He watched it. And
Let me say it.
Dispossessed of
Eden.”
—William Faulkner
Go Down, Moses

They couldn’t help it—
Q loved Thucydus just like
Like Buck loved Buddy.

The Bad Seed Uncles—
Gnarled Adamic twisted twins
The Curse continues.

Q and Thucydus—
Their Slaver white-trash karma
Catching up with them.

Straight out of Eden—
The two young masters—
Flee down to Mississippi.

Southern decadence—
Miscegenal incest love
Cain and Able.

Carolina Queers

“His own brother
His own brother.
No No Not even him!”
—William Faulkner
Go Down, Moses

Young stud Thucydus—
Carothers McCaslin’s
Well-hung brother.

Teenage Thucydus—
Shadow-family brother
Carolina hunk.

Lucius Quintus—
Queer for well-hung Thucydus
Carothers’ bad seed.

Like Cain & Able—
Possessed by miscegenal
Incestuous love…

Like Buck and Buddy—
Isaac’s queer twin uncles
Plantation masters.

Carolina sin—
Runs deep in the Family
Carothers brothers.

Q and Thucydus—
Transgenerational sin
Adamic boyfriends.

Yoknapatawpha Exiles

“Thucydus fits the surmisable
facts equally whether his acts
are motivated by a desire to
free himself from the will of a
grandfather (L.Q.C.'s father)”
—Noel Polk & Richard Godden,
"Reading the ledgers,” The
Mississippi Quarterly 07-01-2002

Or a half brother—
Who wants to sleep him and
Make love (L.Q.C.).

It’s simply awful—
The Carolina Scandal
Father is outraged!!!

Lucius Quintus—
And young handsome Thucydus
Their brotherly love…

Father’s Will reneged—
Pissed off like Colonel Sutpen
Dingy Dynasty!!!

Kicking both of them—
L.Q.C. and Thucydus
Outta the Garden.

For tasting the Fruit—
From the Forbidden Tree
Eden dispossessed.

Exiled all the way—
Down to Yoknapatawpha
Mississippi Delta.

Queer Ledgers

“perhaps upon some
apocryphal Bench or
even Altar or perhaps
before the Throne Itself
for a last perusal and
contemplation and
refreshment of the
Allknowledgeable.”
—William Faulkner
Go Down, Moses

The gay curse and taint—
Theophilus loved by his
Twin Amodeus.

Lucius Quintus—
Incestuously in love
With young Thucydus.

Even going down—
To the Big Easy to get
His brother a wife.

It’s all written down—
As if by a palimpsest
Shadow Transcriber.

Shadow Narrative

“But the narrative of
this emancipatory
impulse veers towards
alternative and darker
implications”
—Noel Polk & Richard Godden,
"Reading the ledgers,” The
Mississippi Quarterly 07-01-2002

The Brownlee entry—
Beyond oral intercourse
Homo Uncle Buck?

Isaac McCaslin—
Stunned by gay revelations
His homo-subtext?

Shadow Family—
HOMOSEXUALITY
Plus lots of dinge queens?

Well-hung Thucydus—
Tomey’s Turl’s dark 12 inches
Sizequeen Uncle Buck?

Interracial—
Antebellum Romance
Henry Sutpen knows?

The Legers don’t lie—
Polyvocally perverse
A House of Mirrors.

Going Down on Moses

"Allknowledgeable
even perhaps far
from readable”
—Noel Polk & Richard Godden,
"Reading the ledgers,” The
Mississippi Quarterly 07-01-2002

Brownlee is homo—
And his being homo is
Why Uncle Buck buys him.

Everyone knows it—
Uncle Buddy knows why too
Buck needs some loving.

Young handsome Brownlee—
Is the only slave that Buck’s
Ever bought or sold.

Isaac can’t believe—
His father Theophilus
McCaslin is gay.

The Legers

“The legers: a text
virtually unmoored
from conventional
linearity & periodicity.”
—Noel Polk & Richard Godden,
"Reading the ledgers,” The
Mississippi Quarterly 07-01-2002

Critics thru the years—
Have followed Isaac in his
Leaving Brownlee out.

Brownlee episode—
The Story is crucial to
Isaac’s closetry.

The ledger pages—
All the Buck-Buddy entries
Admissions of guilt.

Isaac’s father and
His uncle discussing it
Buck’s love for Brownlee.

Gay Miscegeny

“24 Mar 1856 Who
in hell would buy him?”
—William Faulkner,
Go Down, Moses

Gay miscegeny—
With a young mulatto slave
Liaison of love.

Buck was committing—
The same sins that Isaac claimed
His grandfather did.

His father’s gayness—
Homo miscegeny with
A young black hung slave.

Much worse than L.Q.C.—
Had ever done or could do
Sex with a black man!

Dinge Soap Opera

“19th of Apr 1856 Nobody
You put yourself out of
Market at Cold Water two
months ago I never said
sell him Free him”
—William Faulkner,
Go Down, Moses

Dinge soap opera—
The Family Chronicle takes
A real bad nose dive.

Deep South Tragedy—
What would Jefferson Davis
Say about it all?

Mulatto marriage—
Dinge love miscegeny
Gay brothers and slaves?

Surely it was time—
Don’t Ask & Please Don’t Tell
Delta Bourbons blush!

Going Down on Moses

“22 Apr 1856 I'll
get it out of him”
—William Faulkner,
Go Down, Moses

Just what poor Isaac—
Wanted to hear & to read
There in the ledgers.

His proud McCaslin—
Father getting it on with
His own Twin brother.

What was poor Dixie—
Decadent, Dinge, Down & Out
Coming to these dayz?

But even worse than—
Brotherly incest was the
Negritude Romance!!!

Emancipated Love

“June 13th 1856
How $1 per year
265$ 265 yrs
Who’ll sign his
Free paper?”
—William Faulkner,
Go Down, Moses

A dollar a year—
Would take forever to pay
For doing Nothing.

Isaac stared them—
The ledgers on the table
In the dim lamplight.

He didn’t want to—
Think of Buck his dear father
Fucking Percival.

Or even worse than—
Percival Brownlee’s bunghole
Was his pouty lips!!!

Shameless Animality

“1 Oct 1856 Mule
josephine Broke Leg
@ shot Wrong stall
wrong niger wrong
everything $100 dolars”
—William Faulkner,
Go Down, Moses

“Holy Mackerel, dare!!!”—
Stunned Kingfish said to Andy
“Messing with a Mule?”

“That Percival boy—
He be worse than dummy Ike
With that stupid cow!!!”

“Zoophilia!!!”—
That Percival Brownlee boy
Sounds like a winner.”

Uncle Buck just laughed—
Uncle Buddy shook his head.
Yoknapatawpha!!!

The Bill

“2 Od 1856 Freed
Debit McCaslin @
McCaslin $265 dolars”
—William Faulkner,
Go Down, Moses

Isaac is aghast—
His father & gay uncle
Right there in Writing!

Uncle Buddy so—
Succinct about the affair
So short & bitchy.

His entries concise—
“What would father say or do?”
Billing Buck for it.

$100 for the Mule—
$250 for Percival Brownlee
Keeps it businesslike.

Conducting Business

“Buddy's reaction to
Buck's purchase of
Percival Brownlee
is a response first
to his twin's
homosexuality and
second to his
purchase of a slave
to satisfy his lusts”
—Noel Polk & Richard Godden,
"Reading the ledgers,” The
Mississippi Quarterly 07-01-2002

“Oct 3th Debit
Theophilus McCaslin
Niger 265$ Mule 100$
365$ He hasnt gone
yet Father should
be here”

Plantocracy rules—
It’s hard to give up the old
Slavery lingo.

Both Buck and Buddy—
Believe in ending the Curse
Freeing the slave trade.

Ditching the Mansion—
Letting the slaves move into
The Plantation Dive.

The Deep South ruins—
Decadent Antebellum
White Trash Trailer Court.

Gay Divorce

“31 Oct 1856
Renamed him what?”
—William Faulkner,
Go Down, Moses

Trying to save it—
His gay marriage to Buddy
Uncle Buck is nice.

Gives Buddy a chance—
To give Percival Brownlee
A new Free Man’s Name.

Although gay divorce—
Probably seemed rather queer
More queer than marriage.

Even today when gay—
Marriages are legal in some
States, divorce isn’t.

Uncle Buddy’s Dish

“Chrstms 1856
Spintrius”
—William Faulkner,
Go Down, Moses

Sweet sonorities—
Gay phonemic mutations
Anus sphincter joys!!!

Buddy as Spinster—
Sphinx and sphincter queen bee
All the lovely names.

"Spinster" ‘cause Buddy—
Fears Brownlee as a rival
sees himself as old maid.

“Sphinx" ‘cause Percival—
Has tried to mate with a mule
And not a lion.

"Sphincter" ‘cause Brownlee—
Is anally colored brown
As is “brown nosing.”

Permutations & Promiscuities

“Since Buck is probably
as puzzled as we are by
Buddy's choice of name,
we may assume either
that he too plays the
phonemic permutations
towards their promiscuities
or that he turns away.”
—Noel Polk & Richard Godden,
"Reading the ledgers,” The
Mississippi Quarterly 07-01-2002

Amodeus is—
Buddy's name ("I love God")
Is Latin they say.

Theophilus is—
Buck's name which in the Greek is
"Beloved of God.’

More literally—
"God loves he" & maybe
Percival as well?

These classical names—
For both of the Twins suggests
That their love is one.

Brother Love

“That the loves of one
are inextricable from
the loves of the other:
to translate, Amodeus
loves what Theophilus
is loved by, and, on the
evidence of the ledgers,
God (whether "Deus" or
"Theo") runs a distinct
second to Spintrius as
object of Buck's affections.”
—Noel Polk & Richard Godden,
"Reading the ledgers,” The
Mississippi Quarterly 07-01-2002

Triangulation—
Trinity of classical names
Amodeus, Theophilus.

Creating riddle—
An imperfect chiasmus
Queer “Amo deus.”

“Theo philus” but—
But where “theo” & “amo”
Complement things.

“Amo”-“philus” don’t—
Buck & Buddy McCaslin
A queer chiasmus.

(“The triangulation formed by the trinity of classical names creates a riddle: "Amodeus" and "Theophilus" constitute an imperfect chiasmus: 10 as a clause "Amo deus" inverts and repeats "Theo philus," but where "theo" and "deus" exactly complement one another, "amo" and "philus" do not. In an exact chiasmus Amodeus ('I love God') requires "God loves me" (Theophilus) but "Theophilus," literally translated, means "God loves he." That Buddy's love fails to find its inverse reflection in Buck's name displaces their incest, even as "me" turns into "he." The names deciphered beg the question who is the "he" whom Buck loves in the place of "me?" Spintrius fits. Yet the name Spintrius does not appear in the ledgers until Christmas day, a date of inscription which turns Buddy's choice into a particularly subversive gift: after all, he delivers a Spintrius where one named for God might be expected to deliver a Christ. Does Buddy intimate that he and his twins' sexuality, triangulated through Spintrius-Brownlee's body, might just serve to subvert the Almighty Father? This is the end of the ledger's account of Brownlee, but not of Isaac's. Brownlee again interrupts the story that Isaac wants to tell, of his grandfather's sins, as Isaac moves his narration through the Civil descendants. It seems clear that before Isaac can discuss his grandfather's sexuality, his father's sexuality intrudes.”—Noel Polk, “Reading the ledgers,” The Mississippi Quarterly 07-01-2002)

Ledger Narrative

And so Narrative—
Veers towards darker thoughts
Shadowy ledgers.

Anticipating—
That darkness diurnally
Advancing pages.

Ledgers conducting—
Unavoidable business
Of the Plantation.

Long since past—
Any oral intercourse
Faulkner’s locution.

Tongues of lovers pun—
Subversively into the
Speech of dead brothers.

Apocrypha

"Apocrypha:
a self-consciously
Other”
—Joseph Urgo
Faulkner's Apocrypha:
"A Fable," "Snopes,"
and the Spirit of
Human Rebellion

Yoknapatawpha—
As a writer’s synecdoche
Producing Others.

Alternatives of—
Self and places, other times
Fabulated real(s).

The ledger entries—
Indirectly explaining
Why Isaac's father…

Bought Brownlee for love—
A business transaction
Cotton field logic.

Pornographic Poetics

“a meditation on
an unsublimated,
pornographic poetics
in the emergence of
Yoknapatawpha”
—Kodat, Catherine Gunther
“Posting Yoknapatawpha,”
The Mississippi Quarterly
10-01-2004

It happens each day—
At the Safeway & Wal-Mart
Feuilleton Journalism.

Gossip magazines—
Aspiring to poetics
Of Porno erudition.

Yoknapatawpha—
Auto-eroticism
And intertextuality

Sublimation as—
Satisfaction of porno
Pulp Sanctuaries.

Delta Poetics

“Having used verse,
I would now allow verse
to use me if it could.”
—William Faulkner
Early Prose and Poetry

Perhaps with the same—
Secretly unscrupulous
Intentions for love.

Without repression—
Translating the postage stamp
Into dynamite.

Brownlee’s a good lay—
Even tho he’s no bookkeeper
But that’s just a lie.

To cover up what—
I really needed to be
To love and be loved.