by Robert “Bob” Bussey
Gene Sterling was born on 19 August 1934.Gene’s first memories are from when he was three years old and living in an Oil Field town, Monroe City, Texas, near the Gulf of Mexico, east of Houston and just across Trinity Bay. Near the town of Winnie, Texas, if you know where that is. His father was working for Humble Oil. That oil company was started in Humble, Texas in 1911 and later absorbed by Standard Oil in 1959. His father, because of his work with Humble Oil, moved the family to a Humble Oil employee camp outside Beaumont, and from there to Galena Park, a suburb of Houston, where Gene spent most of his formative years.
During the Summer of 1953 he worked as a “Roustabout” in the oilfields in and around Baytown while residing in Galena Park (30 miles away) hitching-hiking there and back 5 days per week … and was late to work only once. The reason? Working people seemed to recognize that a late-teen attired in overalls, a safety-hat on his head and lunch-pail in his hand did not portend a risk to the driver in those simpler times as the “Crime Rate” (a poem that appears later in this article) in future times would later prove to be.
Galena Park is highlighted in some of Gene’s works. And a little dimpled girl who was 10 years old back then keeps appearing in many of his poems. As he told me, she was the most beautiful little dimpled girl he had ever seen. He fell romantically (not physically) in love with her and has carried her in his heart all these years. In fact, in 1994, many, many years later, he attempted to look her up. She still lived in Texas. He traveled to her town, but she was on a trip somewhere, so they did not get to meet. He was able to speak with her mother, but never to her. And she then regrettably passed away several years later. So, Gene’s fascination with the little dimpled girl was left unresolved. But perhaps that is good for us, since he then placed her in so many of his works either directly or indirectly. You will see her multiple times in the poems that follow.
In regard to the poems, you will notice some spacing between certain words. That is the author’s intent and is not a formatting error. At those spaces you, as the reader, are to pause (a dramatic pause, as they say) to emphasize the word, words or phrase. If you do so, you will find a rhythmic side to Gene’s poems, his poems are almost songs without some of the constraints found in song writing.
To fully understand 1946 (the first poem you will find below) you need to have either lived through those times, or shortly thereafter, or be a history buff. Gene is both. The poem contains various historical references. May of 45 is when Germany surrendered … “we’d breathed a sigh.” September of 1945 is when Japan formally surrendered, after the atomic bomb was dropped on 2 of its cities in August of 1945…the great HURRAH. If you lived through those times as a US citizen or had a parent who was in the military, you can get the feel of the HURRAH. Many American lives were saved. The invasion of Tokyo Bay, which had been planned, would have resulted in many, many American deaths. And at that time, Japan simply was not willing to surrender. Remember the suicide Kamikaze pilots that gave up their lives since Japan had few or no bombs left to drop from their planes.
But, getting back to the poem, the little dimpled girl appears in the third stanza, without mentioning those words. Gene told me that she was the one taken out of school. She was the one who returned to her pre-war home. And he was the one with the great void left in his heart, with no chance of really saying “goodbye” before she left Galena Park. So, with the ending of the war there was great relief, but there was also great frustration and angst when people went out of his life. He, and so many others, were spared the harsh reality of being in the war but were still victims of the war in a different way.
1946
(a brusque, unsettling, moving year)
In May of ‘45, we’d breathed a sigh
of great relief. Then in September raised
an August HURRAH! War’s madness was done,
mad men done in, events that brought an end
to rationing of tires and gasoline
and other doled out mobile needs. Thus those
who’d built our ships and planes, our tanks and guns;
beat idle, vintage plowshares into swords;
who’d drilled oil wells or cracked the costly crude;
or brokered campgrounds for our valiant troops;
who’d given fathers, husbands, brothers, sons,
to halt horrific war on distant shores—
where it’d begun— if moved, if they so chose,
they then could take their children out of school,
return to prewar homes and start anew
where they had well established, deeper roots.
Avoiding sad farewells, some left in haste.
Acute awareness of their absence grew
until replaced by resignation’s ache.
Oh, some departures left great voids, God knows!
Spared war’s horrendous, stark realities,
how odd that battles waged so far away
had drawn so many lives to one small place,
in that grave cause, then peace negate all save
the onset of my frequent backward gaze.
Had we escaped war’s greater tragedies,
to be the casualties of warfare’s close?
Caught in the wake of that great sigh and cheer,
a new reality obtained:
Belief
in constancy appreciably decreased….
Of those we’d hoped would stay, their numbers waned,
until what might —what could have been— was changed.
And nothing that had been would long remain except, enduring evocative names.
The next poem, “Crime Rate” does not contain any reference to the little dimpled girl. Somehow, I wish it did. Instead, this poem is a comment on how society has had to change due to the rising rate of crime. Gene lived in Galena Park when you did not have to lock your doors either during the day or during the night. Crime was pretty much non-existent, even though Galena Park was a suburb of Houston. Streetlights are used as an example of how crime has affected our society in some unexpected ways. His little town of Galena Park had none, but the streetlights of Houston some miles away were bright enough to block out most of the starlight. You had to drive further into the countryside to see the Milky Way. While streetlights are needed to help lessen crime (crime likes darkness) those same lights ruin an aspect of living that is to be treasured. The act of simply being able to look up at night to see the Milky Way and the countless stars in the heavens.
Crime Rate
(expediency)
Our crime rate’s unrelenting rise
has driven us inside
vast space of fear allaying man-made lights:
in parking lots; along our streets;
our lawns; and forts disguised
as walled-in, gated neighborhoods where we
will seldom see, thus rarely speak
to those who live beside
safe-havens into which we now retreat.
Due to our crime-spawned safety needs,
we’ve, —unintendedly—
deprived grandchildren’s eyes of astral beams:
mankind’s trustworthy guides across
both seas and lands; and scenes
inspiring reverent awe of their designs.
In light of fabled Cain’s disgrace,
our starlit nights give way
to makeshift means dark deeds necessitate.
Post Eden Yawn, the next poem, again introduces the little dimpled girl from Galena Park. Eden refers back to Galena Park. I was told that the poem goes with 1946, the first poem in this article. This poem was written in 1994, after Gene went to search for the little dimpled girl, only to find that she was not home. That girl is the “gift of May” that was taken away, and her leaving happened in 1946. The poem reflects a wish by the author to go back to a simpler time. A time when you did not have to lock the doors to your house. The second stanza is filled with the emotional reaction that Gene had to the little dimpled girl moving out of Galena Park without him having a chance for a real goodbye. As so many of us do, there is anger in those lines for being robbed of something special. The last several lines, all carefully set out in italics brings the reader into the almost present. The author is praying for one last chance to see and speak with the little dimpled girl. One last chance to feel youthful again.
Post Eden Yawn
(mistakenly labeled Puppy Love)
When ‘46 turned just three months, four days of age, precipitantly,
the gift of May was hastened away from fenceless Eden’s dewy glades.
Distressed I did not get inchoate love professed, in petulant haste—
and sullen, puerile speech— I bitterly complained, misstating my grief:
to not forget exchange. But, no parting word or touch? Not one last look?!
Then hiding my thwarted eyes behind late-latent lids, I soon withdrew
into repressive sleep and languished teen-years through in bleak, sorrow’s keep.
By arcane means, might she have overheard my deep, precocious hurt, thought—
perhaps, believed— my anguished words meant discontent with her? my
pained yawp
ill-spent on callous fate’s indifference; youth’s too brief benevolence….
If she heard me then, mightn’t she hear me, even now, my ardent plea?
Permit me one last boon? Please? Refresh my dusk as you once did our dawn,
with your now mien: your womanhood achieved. Restore my lost, boyish glee.
If you can grant me this much-longed for beneficence, pray, do, but soon;
for my post-Eden yawn foreshadows more than callow, bleak, sorrow’s sleep.
The next poem uses Irish Mythology. But might the author have disguised his real meanings in the clothing of mythology. Upon questioning, Gene told me that the little dimpled girl, the one he knew back in Galena Park, Texas when she was 10 years old, is hiding in the shadows of this poem. He described the little dimpled girl as simply the most beautiful girl he had ever seen. She exists “off stage” in the poem according to Gene. But if you read the poem and put Gene in the place of Oisin and put the little dimpled girl in the place of Niamh, then the little dimpled girl comes front and center. Is she Niamh, the goddess who lured Oisin into the land where you never grow old? Is that land Galena Park, Texas, and is the poem about the author’s memories from those times, a memory that never grows old? A memory about a little dimpled girl that “echoes in his mind.” Is this really the author’s lamentations about his loss of the little dimpled girl who suddenly left Galena Park when WW 2 was ended? I got the impression that it was, but the poem can also simply be read as an historical account from Irish Mythology. (Weren’t the Irish known to be sly with their limericks?)
Oisin’s Lamentation
(from what Oisin dictated to St. Patrick)
In time, oh Time, befriend my mind.
Though nothing can remain the same,
and all must yield to your demands,
extend, oh Time, compassion,
by drowning out the laving sound
of this gray-green, cold sea. Its kind
fold poignant tides on mortal lands
in an ageless, moving fashion,
repeating: ¹ Oisin, Oisin, Oisin,
as fair ² Niamh once sighed my name,
ensconcing ageless passion.
Her sunset lips pearl-pale face
defy the skill of mortal tongue—
and even ³ Ogma’s golden chains.
So too, her mien, sweetly bold.
Soft sighs still echo in my mind,
of she who left the haunting trace
that calls to me from her domain,
what her salt-tears at parting told,
repeating: Oisin, Oisin, Oisin.
There she remains —forever young.
Beyond her realm, I’ve now grown old.
² A goddess, the daughter of Manannán mac Lir , god of the sea, and one of the queens of Tíír na nÓÓg, the land of eternal youth.
³ The god of eloquence, often depicted as having chains of gold and amber connecting the ears of devotees to his tongue.
The last poem is presented below. I will leave it up to each reader to read and enjoy. But, let me say that this one also contains historical references to Gene’s youth. At any rate, I know many of us who grew up in the 40”s and 50” can relate to many of the metaphors, phrases, human behaviors and emotions that are contained in this poem.
through a child’s attentive eyes than—
dare I cliché— a needle’s eye.
A child’s
admiring eyes may be effortlessly
enticed to see things as being true,
by simply hiding the Truth in plane sight,
when viewed through profit-motovated modes
designed to foster misguided beliefs
which falsify where truth more truly lies.
A naïve child is easily deceived
Back in the ‘40s, when I had reached
sufficient height, enough for me to see
outside from my assigned back seat in our
new ‘41Ford, black, Custom Club Coupe ….
I still can see my father igniting
those Turkish and Domestic blends, the sine
qua non of all eye-catching, false icons
designed to faux-define REAL MEN, back then.
I loved the scent of the smoke’s very first
beguiling puff’s enticing aroma
sent wafting back my way, inciting hope
that I could be like him, when all grown up,
including, you know, I also smoke.
Long past those formative years, one July,
four sweltry nights into age eighty-three,
his gnarled, grown-feeble hand in mine,
he died.
The incense of his days had all gone up
in smoke.
But not before I’d this insight
achieved, one clear Pavlovian truth perceived:
It truly wasn’t all that smoke, you know,
but rather my father whom I’d loved so.
One last bit about Gene. He isn’t published, not self-published or published by any printing company. I get the impression that publication is not a burning desire of his. Setting down his thought and emotions in poetic form does burn in his heart and mind. He has appeared in the LSU-A Verbatim internet publication. He had 2 of his poems published there. So, if you want to catch Gene, or read or listen to any more of his very thoughtful work, you need to go to one of the poetry readings that occur around CenLa periodically. If you do, then look for an elderly man who speaks with a gentle but commanding tone. That will be Gene. And, if you look over his shoulder, you might just catch a glimpse of the little dimpled girl still following him around.
Robert Bussey is a local attorney and poet who has resided in CenLa since 1986. He interviews other poets and then writes these articles to help promote poetry. You can reach him at Rlbussey450@icloud.com if you are a poet and would like to be interviewed.