Daily Lafferty # 10

"These are bitter grits that we eat from the trains of Appalachia: their own hogs eat finer than we do. Consider the wealths in High Appalachia: the red grapes of Roane and the white grapes of Smokey Mountain Vineyards; the sweet corn centers of fertile Shelby, and the popcorn plantations of Cumberland; the flax, the wool, the cotton, the Jim-pie-weed cloth; the peat and the coal and the pine-knots for fuel; the rock oil from the hills and the catfish oil from the streams; the pumpkin bread, the hickory nut bread, the bean bread every day of the week; fat beef, fat pork, fat mutton; ducks and geese and woodcock and savanna hen; turkey and guinea; the plump rabbits of Ozarkia and the meaty woodchucks of Doniphan; light wheat, dark rye, barley, and rolling fields of oats; sunflower seeds, pecans and peanuts. Would it be robbery if we took our fair share of these things, nor waited for their niggardly food trains?"

-R. A. Lafferty, 'Assault On Fat Mountain' (1975)

Daily Lafferty - # 4

“I was never an advocate of wealth and fineness. I believe fully in holy poverty. But I say that poverty is like drink: a little of it is stimulating and creative; too much of it is depraved and horrifying.”


-R. A. Lafferty, Past Master (1968)