SOUTHERN DECADENCE

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SOUTHERN DECADENCE
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Southern Decadence

“How does literary utterance
arrange itself when it tries to
imagine an Africanist other?”
—Toni Morrison, Playing in
the Dark: Whiteness and
the Literary Imagination

After awhile then—
I stopped reading as reader
And read as writer.

How did they do it—
How did Southern writers join
Sex & Negritude?

I’d read about the—
Way Ginsberg wrote his poems
About Cassady.

All those Beatnik odes—
To his Denver hustler dude
Burned out so early.

But that wasn’t gay—
The kind of gay that I knew
That was real for me.

Miss Genet Miss Gide

The same with Genet—
Our Lady of the Flowers
And The Thief’s Journal.

Something was missing—
Stilitano was close tho
That handsome young thug.

Getting lost that way—
In the vast corridors of
The House of Mirrors.

And I read Miss Gide—
Yet The Immoralist left
Me cold as dry ice.

Faulkner was such a—
Rambling closet-case with his
Absalom novel.

Well, it drove me nuts—
The way he evoked Southern
Homosexual fear.

Bon & Henry’s sex—
Incestuous, sullen with
Miscegenal sulk.

Quentin in Harvard—
Getting fucked by butchy Shreve
Then his suicide.

Fetishizing blood—
Black blood, white blood, brotherly
Sexuality.

I kept wondering—
Is there something for me in
Giovanni’s Room?

The Confessions of Nat Turner

Nat Turner confessed—
William Styron begins and
Ends without success.

But one thing I liked—
The title had a certain
Black-white resonance.

Like Madame Melville—
With the great White Whale & his
Racially mixed crew.

Confronting Whiteness—
As the white male captain who
Knew its impenetrability.

Unlike Madame Poe—
Who evaded yet registered
The dinge cul de sac.

And so Confessions—
Ended up being my so-called
Gay Lit strategy.

Delta Bourbon

“But there are
unmanageable
slips. The black
slave Jupiter is
said to whip his
master in “The
Gold Bug.”

“It be ugly”—
young Jupiter Jones opined
About Bill Faulkner.

Jupiter Jones was—
The young Negro handyman
There at Rowan Oaks.

He did what slaves do—
Except he got paid for it
And Faulkner liked him.

Young Jupiter was—
In fact, the black shiny Pearl
In Faulkner’s sex-life.

Rowan Oaks

“Would you believe it?
He had prepared a huge
stick, the other day
with which to chastise
my for giving him the
slip…my ill looks alone
saved me a flogging”
—Edgar Allan Poe,
“The Gold Bug”

Southern guilt, well—
Mississippi gentlemen
Sometimes they like dinge.

The desperate needs—
Of this great Southern writer
They’ve remained hidden.

Miss Faulkner had great—
Pretensions about being
Planter Class Elite.

Little is it known—
That he practiced the art
Of Dinge Angelology.

Dinge Angelology

Morrison’s List—
Estranging language &
Fetishization.

Stereotyping—
Allegorical closets,
Incest & bondage.

But one strategy—
Overlooked by those
Astute critics is…

Some Southern S/M—
The Slave Master as Slave
Beneath the Black Whip

Getting whipped a lot—
It does wonders for Whiteys
Sadomasochistic chic.

Getting whipped a lot—
By Jupiter in the old
Woodshed late at night.

Just as the black slave—
Jupiter whipped his master
In Poe’s “The Gold Bug.”

Jupiter Jones was—
So built like a brick shithouse
It just made Bill weep.

Faulkner’s deep secret—
His hidden closet desire
To be Negro Slave.

Sanctuary

Most Delta Bourbons—
Were afflicted by such guilt
It’s a well-known fact.

Popeye is just one—
White Trash example of
Pulp Fiction Bad Seed.

Delta Bourbons were—
Into Sex & Perversion
Deep South Decadence.

Pervert Faulkner let—
His knickers down just for fun
With “Sanctuary.”

Actually he was—
Broke as usual so he
Did a Pot-Boiler.

Naturally it—
Was a tremendous success
At the bus-stations.

And train depots where—
Young soldiers were going off
To the Korean War.

Popeye’s lover Red—
Fucking Temple Drake silly
In Miss Reba’s joint.

Down there in Memphis—
Gangster Capitol of the
Prohibition Dayz.

Southern Gentleman

Jupiter Jones whipped—
Faulkner late at night
After the Nobel.

The mendacity—
Of pretending to be a
“Big Daddy” to the world.

The hypocrisy—
Of Faulknerian bullshit
Too much even for him.

S & M cleansed him—
Punishing the Pretender
With a hundred blows.

“It wasn’t pretty”—
Jupiter Jones said today
To the NYTimes.

“Master Bill get drunk—
Then I have to whip his ass
He be a Bad Boy!”

Faulkner as White Trash

No wonder Faulkner—
Trashed his pulp fiction novel
It was pure White Trash

Sanctuary sold—
Rather nicely since Faulkner
Was broke & needy.

Pretty soon his book—
Flooded lonely bus and
Stark train station racks.

Paperback were in—
Back then in the Fifties &
Skanky sexy Sixties.

The lurid covers—
Flaunting the tacky lifestyle
Of postwar white trash.

Back before jet planes—
Lonely gaunt young servicemen
Heading here or there.

Cheap entertainment—
Pulp fiction literature
Lucrative market.

Faulkner’s lewd novel—
Went thru many editions
Helped to pay the bills.

Hoity-toity Lit—
Like The Sound and the Fury
Didn’t sell as well.

Red & Miss Reba—
Temple Drake fucking in bed
It was real hot stuff.

Rednecks & white trash—
Liked Storytelling that way
And can you blame them?