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Nebraska poet and rancher Larry Holland died suddenly in a traffic accident
in March. He was on his way to see the Sandhill Cranes. Over the course of
his life, by his own admission,
he'd been a woodsman, lumberman, teacher, father, husband,
horsebacker, canoeist, hunter, fisherman, backpacker, photographer,
writer, and moderate liar.
He liked to say he figured to live out his days as a Nebraskan.
At least he got his wish. The following tribute is by writer and friend
Paul Zarzyski. It was read by Jim Brummels at a memorial in The Uptown,
Norfolk, shortly after Larry's death.
LETTER TO LARIAT "LASH LARUE" HOLLAND FROM BARWHISKEY ZARZYSKI
(3/22/99)
So now you're forkin' Pegasus, that ol' winged cayuse pretending he's a
guldamn duck-'n-'dive nighthawk chasin' skeeters — or worse, a flushed
woodcock, at warp 10 acrobatic speed, trying to slip between your double
barrels' worth of birdshot. And there's Mister
Boastful Bill, Hisself, riding right alongside you and booming out our
favorite stanza to that Charles Badger Clark tribute to Him:
(and I do mean "BOOMING OUT!")
I'm a bronco-twistin' wonder on the fly!
I'm the ridin' son of thunder of the sky!
HI! You earthlin's shut your winders
While we're rippin' clouds to flinders —
If this blue-eyed darlin' kicks at you, you die!
Yes, "you die," but then you fly, right Lar? Sure as shit-'n-'shootin',
we're happy for you on that note, but, at the same time, we're stuck here
with ol' gimpy grandpa gravity and missing you a bunch. And I'm likely
lonesomer than most today, cuz I can't be with the big herd of Holland
cronies at The Uptown tonight. No doubt, they'll be sippin' top-shelf
single-malt Scotch and eatin' at least 50 of our favorite 2 kinds of pies,
hot and cold.
Better yet, they'll be deep-dishing up your poetry, which proves once and
for
all that the way to a man's or woman's, or even a horse's or dog's,
heart is NOT through the stomach, but
through the soul.
Your book, Disciples of an Uncertain Season, wins
The UniPoet Prize, which bests the Pulitzer and Nobel by a nose — and
not just any nose, but THEE nose attached to MY Polack-Wop pan. I'll
cherish the inscription you wrote in my copy during the Nebraska
Literary Festival in Wayne last September. (What an honor to read with
you — like riding broncs
against Casey Tibbs and scoring only a couple points lower.) I'll cherish
your EVERY word to me,
Larry — your hundreds of letters I've saved over our 15 years of
friendship so 200-proof pure, we were
convinced we rode together in other lives. And then there's this little
cotton buckin' hoss bandana you sported in your buckaroo boyhood.
What a terrific gift you sent my way a couple weeks back.
I plan to frame the blue beauty and hang 'er here in the writing room
(real poets don't have "offices" or tote brief cases, right Lar?)
above my beloved 1952
baby blue Smith-Corona Silent-Super (real poets don't own computers either,
'ey Lar?!). I'm gonna spike 'er up between my autographed ("to THE
UniPoet") Richard Farnsworth glossy — him cradling a Colt .45 and
garbed in full trainrobber regalia from his role as The Gray Fox
— between Dick Farnsworth and the shot of me spurrin' Whiskey Talks
to the tooter during the first
go-'round of The Montana Summer Circuit Finals back in '87.
All to say, Amigo, "thanks for the memorabilia and, moreover, for the
gold-buckle
memories — from Norfolk to Flat Crick, from Elkhorn Review to
My Link to the Plains to Disciples of an Uncertain Season.
I'm both a better human being and writer for having lived a life
graced by your friendship — for having made my camp in the same West
that knew the
strong hossback gaits of your ticker. And, finally, speaking of
"hosses," you'd asked me for a copy of that old S Omar Barker poem,
"Horses Vs Hosses," so you could learn it for the Nebraska Cowboy
Poetry Gathering this Fall. Sorry I didn't send it sooner. But the other
night, flyin' the Monte
Carlo back to the place late — after the Charlie Russell Auction,
where I
guzzled just a skosh too much tonsil varnish and couldn't keep my damn
Polish-Hobo-Rodeo-Poet paw outta the air when a great Walter Piehl
Bronc-Twister acrylic was quickly bid up to the tune of far more than
I've ever
paid for a car or horse — while I was doin' 95 under the big Milky
Way sky, I said the poem out loud to you. I know you heard me cuz a silver
bullet of a star shot across the ol' cowpoke cosmos as I recited that
terrific closure —
... so you can have your horses with their high-falutin gloss
We'll (me and Larry Holland) take four-legged rawhide
Or in other words, A HOSS!
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From one Hoss to another, LOVE
Luck, and Let 'er Buck!
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