Giving Thanks in the USA

Herb’s Blog, Herbdate 24036 – 1331

Here’s the haps:

Today is Thanksgiving Day here in the U.S.A., and I have so much I am thankful for. If you click on the link in the menu, or this link, you will go to a list of 42 things I wrote last year. It’s just a drop in the bucket, of course. A few years ago, I also posted a tradition that we have done for many years, so please enjoy this and a couple of memes.

I have read this poem at every Thanksgiving gathering we have had for around 40 years. Ernest Vincent Wright wrote it. His real claim to fame (in my opinion) is that he wrote a 50,110-word novel called “Gadsby.” In all of those words, he never used the letter “e,” which is the most common letter in the English language. He tied down the “e” key on his typewriter so he would not be able to use it. I have the book and plan to read it, but I have a couple of other reads ahead of it. I just think that’s pretty cool.

Anyway, here is the poem, written in (I believe) 1891:

When Father Carves The Duck

We all look on with anxious eyes
When father carves the duck,
And mother almost always sighs
When father carves the duck;

Then all of us prepare to rise,
And hold our bibs before our eyes,
And be prepared for some surprise,
When father carves the duck.

He braces up and grabs a fork
Whene’er he carves a duck,
And won’t allow a soul to talk
Until he’s carved the duck.

The fork is jabbed into the sides,
Across the breast the knife he slides,
While every careful person hides
From flying chips of duck.

The platter’s always sure to slip
When father carves a duck,
And how it makes the dishes skip!
Potatoes fly amuck!

The squash and cabbage leap in space,
We get some gravy in our face,
And father mutters a Hindoo grace
Whene’er he carves a duck.

We then have learned to walk around
The dining room and pluck
From off the window-sills and walls
Our share of father’s duck.

While father growls and blows and jaws
And swears the knife was full of flaws,
And mother laughs at him because
He couldn’t carve a duck.

~By E. V. Wright

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ALso, I was over at Marty the Writer’s blog, Words With Pizza, and discovered a slice of his blog called The Probably True Story of Thanksgiving, which I enjoyed. He likes comments, so make sure to leave him a note if you visit him.

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