a brief poem that came to me in a dream
Legends of Crushable Steve
Crushable Steve was a man out of love, some said. Doomed to walk and slow to talk, but he could dance the bonnie fritz fit to make the cattle moan. Damn his hide.
Crushable Steve was terrible to behold with the naked eye, standing as he did between the sun at every angle. It’s said that shades were invented so as to catch him coming into town. Better to get the womenfolk down cellar, it’s said, and the men to start shuttin’ up windows.
Old Steve could lead a man to sin faster than you can lead a horse to water. That much I know. His moves were red hot. Without equal among man or beast. Quick as a cattail, whisky on a summer’s day.
Steve could count ten on a two-piece at thirty yards or more. He could spin a timber down to picks, tip, stick, and all. But Crushable Steve was no common house jay neither. Never let a dill-roast sit. Never cooked a cow he couldn’t outlive, fair and square.
Daddy broke a cartwheel out on the pack road one winter’s night. Before he could say the words, there was Crushable Steve up on the hill, root in hand and ready as a noonday hog. Safe to say, Momma doesn’t cook oyster no more, and God bless her for it.
You ever mark that shallow valley of flesh above a man’s upper lip? The soft set of it, like a sanded stroke of God’s own chisel? Back home we call that the Stevesway, on account of the tales.
Was a time that men were safe in pants alone; now, tuck a shirttail loose and you’re apt as not to get tossed a’breeze. Better men than you have gotten fined a bushel more than the orchard bore, so to speak. That’s to say, Crushable Steve could bone and baste like a country hare, and with a sprig on top to taste.
Steve, he gave up shootin’ before Adam had a holy hair on his brow. Only keeps it on his hip to show you what’s what. Gives you a fix like hot lead, though, sure enough. Doesn’t seem right. All those fingers and not a trigger between ‘em.
some significant amount of the creative writing i do is based on dreams.
two years ago on February 9 between the hours of approximately four to six am, i was visited in dreams by a striking apparition---unknowable in image and aspect yet dire in his effect on my unconscious mind. i woke suddenly with a strong and inexplicable crush on this figure. i knew him intimately. i could not recall his face. his name was Crushable Steve.
i kinda forgot about Crushable Steve until i attended the zine release/open mic of L'or Singh's Fuckin' Transplants: volume 4 (an excellent collection of t4t smut which you should seek out and own) and felt called to perform but had already read all my smut at prior open mics. well, i thought, there was that one poem i wrote two years ago. and just like that Crushable Steve returned to me.
i hope Steve resonates with you as he did with me. please refer inquiries, illustrations, and love letters for him to eviewrites@duck.com. (i will read them and, in so doing, hold them in my subconscious mind for Steve to hopefully find; i cannot guarantee when or if he will pass through again, but i will appreciate the messages all the same.) follow on Bluesky Substack and IG @everzines. sub the newsletter.
your lost+lonesome heart,
evergreen<3