06-26-2021, 10:54 AM
The Wide Awake Library Presents
Custer’s Last Song
A cut-up in six acts
Act I: In which the 7th Cavalry stumbles upon Sitting Bull’s Bighorn Pastorale
Denounced by the waischu as persons
liable to to bear a charmed life
the Sioux were making
a slight burning noise.
Custer’s audition had been revealed
by the arrival of a booking agent known
to represent The Famous Codys.
Here on the Little Big Horn
at last was his moment. Saying goodbye
to his Crow scouts, he gave them
a man with a brain like a cash register.
Act II: In which Custer interrupts Sitting Bull’s Sun Dance
Lonesome Charlie, Custer’s silent partner,
scrutinized a distant point of land,
where a giantess and an armless man
hung suspended to the sun,
blood dripping from their pinioned chests.
Aroused to action, Custer immediately
gave the order to stop the show.
Custer paid no heed to the audience's dismay.
It was mischief all the way as his squadron
galloped after the impulsive Custer.
Passing through a coulee of brush and rock,
they followed the general.
They leaped over the footlights,
all the brave squadron, like trained seals.
Act III: In which Crazy Horse upstages Col. Custer
"Not to continue is impossible,"
shouted Custer. But he grew excessively nervous
for the first time since changing into his costume.
His troop crowded its way around him,
ugly-looking and determined,
dropping dead about the orchestra floor
stripped naked by the angry Sioux.
Custer saw someone mounted
on a white horse dash up the bluffs.
The horse's colored markings
indicated that the young fellow was Crazy Horse.
Women screamed and went out of their perceptible minds
and Custer’s face expressed evident displeasure.
Act IV: In which Custer retaliates with Song
Soon backstage the Cheyenne stagehands
caused panic among the troopers
piercing their blue coats with arrow and bullet.
Only the combined efforts of the song plugger,
Verner Hicks, and the ticket seller, Jimmy Flynn,
protected Custer. Just then Custer leaped
head first in front of the velvet hangings
and sang a stanza of "Mason, my boy, are you here?”
Act V: In which Custer Steals the Show
There was an enforced wait
(so Chief Gall, backstage manager remembered),
as Custer's unexpected song
had upset the drummers' paraphernalia
which tumbled down into the Little Big Horn.
Then Custer, humming the Garry Owen, pushed his way
out in front of the next act,
a Hunkpapa war dance. What ensued
could not be invented. This cacophony
behind the curtain brought confusion
on the audience and then the curtain rose
on a resplendent Custer.
Act VI: Custer’s Last Song
“The pleasure of killing lasts only a moment,
the grief of love lasts an intermission.
I gave up everything for the ungrateful Sioux,
they are leaving me for other lovers.
The pleasure of scalping lasts only a moment,
the groans of love lasts an intermission.
‘As long as the Little Bighorn runs gently
towards this brook which borders this massacre,
I will love you’, Sitting Bull told me repeatedly.
The water still runs, but he has changed.
The pleasure of dying lasts only a moment,
The grief of glory lasts a lifetime.”
Text sources: Col. J. M. Traver, Custer's Last Shot (1882); New York Clipper Oct. 13, 1920;
Jean-Pierre Claris de Florian, Plaisir d'Amour (17??)
Custer’s Last Song
A cut-up in six acts
Act I: In which the 7th Cavalry stumbles upon Sitting Bull’s Bighorn Pastorale
Denounced by the waischu as persons
liable to to bear a charmed life
the Sioux were making
a slight burning noise.
Custer’s audition had been revealed
by the arrival of a booking agent known
to represent The Famous Codys.
Here on the Little Big Horn
at last was his moment. Saying goodbye
to his Crow scouts, he gave them
a man with a brain like a cash register.
Act II: In which Custer interrupts Sitting Bull’s Sun Dance
Lonesome Charlie, Custer’s silent partner,
scrutinized a distant point of land,
where a giantess and an armless man
hung suspended to the sun,
blood dripping from their pinioned chests.
Aroused to action, Custer immediately
gave the order to stop the show.
Custer paid no heed to the audience's dismay.
It was mischief all the way as his squadron
galloped after the impulsive Custer.
Passing through a coulee of brush and rock,
they followed the general.
They leaped over the footlights,
all the brave squadron, like trained seals.
Act III: In which Crazy Horse upstages Col. Custer
"Not to continue is impossible,"
shouted Custer. But he grew excessively nervous
for the first time since changing into his costume.
His troop crowded its way around him,
ugly-looking and determined,
dropping dead about the orchestra floor
stripped naked by the angry Sioux.
Custer saw someone mounted
on a white horse dash up the bluffs.
The horse's colored markings
indicated that the young fellow was Crazy Horse.
Women screamed and went out of their perceptible minds
and Custer’s face expressed evident displeasure.
Act IV: In which Custer retaliates with Song
Soon backstage the Cheyenne stagehands
caused panic among the troopers
piercing their blue coats with arrow and bullet.
Only the combined efforts of the song plugger,
Verner Hicks, and the ticket seller, Jimmy Flynn,
protected Custer. Just then Custer leaped
head first in front of the velvet hangings
and sang a stanza of "Mason, my boy, are you here?”
Act V: In which Custer Steals the Show
There was an enforced wait
(so Chief Gall, backstage manager remembered),
as Custer's unexpected song
had upset the drummers' paraphernalia
which tumbled down into the Little Big Horn.
Then Custer, humming the Garry Owen, pushed his way
out in front of the next act,
a Hunkpapa war dance. What ensued
could not be invented. This cacophony
behind the curtain brought confusion
on the audience and then the curtain rose
on a resplendent Custer.
Act VI: Custer’s Last Song
“The pleasure of killing lasts only a moment,
the grief of love lasts an intermission.
I gave up everything for the ungrateful Sioux,
they are leaving me for other lovers.
The pleasure of scalping lasts only a moment,
the groans of love lasts an intermission.
‘As long as the Little Bighorn runs gently
towards this brook which borders this massacre,
I will love you’, Sitting Bull told me repeatedly.
The water still runs, but he has changed.
The pleasure of dying lasts only a moment,
The grief of glory lasts a lifetime.”
Text sources: Col. J. M. Traver, Custer's Last Shot (1882); New York Clipper Oct. 13, 1920;
Jean-Pierre Claris de Florian, Plaisir d'Amour (17??)