David Lee was named the first Poet Laureate of Utah in 1997 and received the Utah Governor’s Award for lifetime achievement in the arts. His work draws on a rich experience that includes seminary study, boxing, raising hogs, and becoming the only white athlete to play for the Negro League Post Texas Blue Stars. Lee lives in Texas, where he and his wife, Jan, moved after he retired as the chair¬man of Southern Utah University’s Department of Language and Literature.

Loading a Boar

by David Lee

We were loading a boar, a goddam mean big sonofabitch and he jumped out of the pickup four times and tore out my stockracks and rooted me in the stomach and I fell down and he bit John on the knee and he thought it was broken and so did I and the boar stood over in the far corner of the pen and watched us and John and I just sat there tired and Jan laughed and brought us a beer and I said, “John it aint worth it, nothing’s going right and I’m feeling half dead and haven’t wrote a poem in ages and I’m ready to quit it all,” and John said, “shit, young feller, you aint got started yet and the reason’s cause you trying to do it outside yourself and aint looking in and if you wanna by god write pomes you gotta write pomes about what you know and not about the rest and you can write about pigs and that boar and Jan and you and me and the rest and there aint no way you’re gonna quit,” and we drank beer and smoked, all three of us, and finally loaded that mean bastard and drove home and unloaded him and he bit me again and I went in the house and got out my paper and pencils and started writing and found out John he was right.


From The Porcine Canticles