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The Screaming Screed and Stench
Sister Cindy, Brother Jed,
Before the cellphone, rumor spread,
“They’re speaking on the Common, dude,
Their testimony’s waxing crude!”
Pioneer, the sawdust trail,
Jed and Cindy, rare to fail:
Taunt, enrage the masses bored.
Were they working for the Lord?
Snake Oil from the old frontier,
Milking worry, fondling fear.
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Song for America
“I think I half-damn hate him,
Would love to bust his frame;
After a bloodlust slaughter,
I’d see him buried in shame.”
Words can cause a murder;
He didn’t pause to think
“The Word of God fought harder”
To keep him off the brink.
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Alec Ream is a writer living in Virginia. His poetic work and creative fiction have been widely published. A member of the Demosthenian Literary Society at UGA, he wrote on Lookout Mountain, and continued to write, lecture and work for Delta Kappa Epsilon HQ. He was first published reading to the pledge class of Michigan DKE, in Ann Arbor in 2008. Recently, his poem Green Fire was read at the Washington Literary Society & Debating Union at UVA.
Alexander!
What a trip down memory lane your Screaming Screed and Stench poem was! I met and (a few times) collaborated with Brother Jed Smock and Sister Cindy in their “ministry”. I was a close friend with Brother Max Lynch, who used to preach very frequently on the Purdue quadrangle when I was there from 1980 to 1983. I sometimes “spelled him out” when his voice was tired (which was hardly ever; he was a perpetual foghorn).
Sometimes, Jed and Cindy joined us on the mall to preach with Brother Max. I think you have captured the scene very well.
Thanks for this poem. I can hardly believe that I was part of that world.
Thanks Paul – I was coming to faith in Christ during that same time. I wasn’t sure about Brother Jed and Sister Cindy. Both Literary Societies, the Greeks, and the devotees would gather to hear (and watch) the show. Among other things, it was much the American custom.
…long before Jerry Springer.
And they look like such nice people! So many things can go wrong. Thanks for a good peek.
CB: you are welcome. I can’t shake the memory of those Free Speech Platform gatherings at UGA.