I love the expression: "Why.....I'm gonna beat you like a rented mule."
It has such clever, antiquated kinda feel to it. You can almost hear the "chew" splashin' out of the old-timer's sunburned lips and drippin' onto his crusty whiskers, as he says those words.
Over the years, that's the visual I sort of get when I read much of Bill Cope's work. Blah, blah, splash, blah.
His writing tends to also give me the image of the angry father behind home plate, screaming his guts out at his little-leaguer in the 9th inning: "C'mon you little SOB, hit the friggin ball" I might imagine him shouting with an over-used and utterly raspy voice.
But if I evoked those images today....I'd be wrong, dead wrong.
I read his piece in the Boise Weekly entitled "The politics and poetry of Bobby" and it was wonderful.
His sensitivity and caring from that period of his life surfaced like fresh water from a deep well - not even with a hint of rust from the old well.
I've only met Bill once - my dear friend, Andy Hedden-Nicely, introduced us on the street in downtown Meridian. He was a pussycat....or so I thought til I read another of his pieces that should have, with claw, turned me into a eunich...
What I saw in the BW piece is that deep down in that well of his, is the heart of a boy with a dream. I commend him for sharing that with us.
He and I share the same admiration of RFK and the journey that took him to his final sentence: "Now, on to Chicago".
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