Ishmael Reed: Yellow Back Radio Broke-Down

I guess I can’t argue against that, Jake said turning to Loop, Zozo and the Juggler. Welcome to my expedition into the unknown.

The children reveled and danced around.

When they finished storing provisions into the wagons the entire party went to sleep. The next morning there would be much work to do. The troupe bedded down in their wagons and the children slept beneath warm buffalo robes.

Loop Garoo was dreaming of bringing down the stars with his tail when all at once he smelled smoke. He awoke to find horsemen surrounding the circle. The children began to scream and some of their clothes caught fire from torches the bandits had tossed into the area. Rapid gunfire started up and the children fell upon each other and ran about in circles as they tried to break the seizure’s grip. Zozo Labrique looked out of her wagon and was shot between the eyes. She dropped to the ground next to the wagon. The pitiful moans of the children could be heard above the din of hoofbeats and gunfire as one by one they were picked off by horsemen who fired with amazing accuracy. The Juggler was firing two rifles and before catching a bullet in his throat was able to down two of the horsemen.

Loop crawled to the place where Zozo lay dying. Blood trickled from her nose and mouth.

Zozo let me see if I can get you inside your wagon.

Flee boy, save yourself, I’m done for, the woman murmured pressing something into his hand. It’s a mad dog’s tooth it’ll bring you connaissance and don’t forget the gris gris, the mojo, the wangols old Zozo taught you and when you need more power play poker with the dead. But Zozo I’ll try to get you a horse, Loop began — but with a start the woman slumped in his arms.

The grizzly Bear had escaped from the cage and was mangling two horsemen. This allowed an opening in the circle which two children raced through, hanging from the sides of horses. Loop did likewise but so as to divert the men from the children rode in a different direction, towards the desert.

Bullet after bullet zitted above his head. When the burning scene of children and carny freaks was almost out of his sight he looked back. His friends the Juggler, a dancing bear, the fast talking Barker and Zozo Labrique were trapped in a deadly circle. Their figurines were beginning to melt.

Loop Garoo had to shoot his hoss. He hated to do it but under the circumstances it turned out to be the wisest thing he could do. The horse was a snafu anyway. One of Drag Gibson’s gunmen had wounded the animal in the leg.

You ever see a horse shot in the movies? So that gives you an idea of the fluke of luck Loop was reeling in on this queer fish of a day. First his fun burned down and now a lame horse. All around as far as one could see — desert. A hot mean and bitchy desert with a naturally formed misanthropic mood seemed to be saying well Loop good buddy, how you want it dished up, scorpion bite, rattlesnake, order anything you see, it seemed to be whispering in the voice of the rude hash slinger of the rockbottom dives of our lives.

Loop, weak and spent, dozed off, his arms stretched out in front of him. In the distance large birds with buzzard coupons could be seen lining up for mess.

He awoke to find himself surrounded by horsemen. The leader of this shabby crew — well they appeared shabby but closer inspection revealed bell bottom denims of a custom-made variety and fancy shirts which must have cost a pretty penny. The scarfs they wore about their necks were of an extravagantly rich material.

If it isn’t the alienated individualist stuck out here in the desert, the leader of these grim horsemen said.

It was Bo Shmo and the neo-social realist gang. They rode to this spot from their hideout in the hills. Bo Shmo leaned in his saddle and scowled at Loop, whom he considered a deliberate attempt to be obscure. A buffoon an outsider and frequenter of sideshows.

Bo Shmo was dynamic and charismatic as they say. He made a big reputation in the thirties, not having much originality, by learning to play Hoagland Howard Carmichael’s “Buttermilk Sky” backwards. He banged the piano and even introduced some novel variations such as sliding his rump across the black and whites for that certain affect.

People went for it. It was in all the newspapers. He traveled from coast to coast exhibiting his ass and everything was fine until the real Hoagland Howard Carmichael (the real one) showed up and went for Bo Shmo’s goat. He called him a lowdown patent thief and railed him out of town. You would think that finding themselves duped, the imposter’s fans would demand his hide. Not so, Americans love being conned if you can do it in a style that is both grand and entertaining. Consider P. T. Barnum’s success, Semple McPherson and other notables. A guy who rigs aluminum prices can get himself introduced by Georgie Jessel at 100 dollars a plate but stealing a can of beer can get you iced.

So sympathetic Americans sent funds to Bo Shmo which he used to build one huge neo-social realist Institution in the Mountains. Wagon trains of neo-social realist composers writers and painters could be seen winding up its path.

Hey Bo, one of his sidekicks spoke up. We’d better blast this guy right off the way I look at it. Nobody will miss him since he went out with that carnival. If he makes it across the desert he might land a typewriter and do a book on his trials. He’ll corner the misery market and pound out one of those Christian confessionals to which we are so much endeared. Then where will we be. How will we buy all these campy cowboy suits…

Shut up, Bo said slapping the man in the face with his prospector’s cap. The other horsemen remained mute. Bo Shmo did all their thinking for them. Their job was merely to fold their arms and look mean at the hoedowns or rather the shakedowns. You see Bo Shmo was a real collectivist. Worked hard at it. Fifty toothbrushes cluttered his bathroom and when he walked down the street it seemed a dozen centipedes headed your way. He woke up in the morning with crowds and went to bed with a mob. The man loved company. It seemed that he wore people under his coat although none of them would pull it for him. He resembled Harpo Marx at times, you know, the scene where Harpo has shoplifted a market and stuffed all the smoked hams under an oversized coat. He looked like that.

The trouble with you Loop is that you’re too abstract, the part time autocrat monarchist and guru finally said. Crazy dada nigger that’s what you are. You are given to fantasy and are off in matters of detail. Far out esoteric bullshit is where you’re at. Why in those suffering books that I write about my old neighborhood and how hard it was every gumdrop machine is in place while your work is a blur and a doodle. I’ll bet you can’t create the difference between a German and a redskin.

What’s your beef with me Bo Shmo, what if I write circuses? No one says a novel has to be one thing. It can be anything it wants to be, a vaudeville show, the six o’clock news, the mumblings of wild men saddled by demons.

All art must be for the end of liberating the masses. A landscape is only good when it shows the oppressor hanging from a tree.

Right on! Right on, Bo, the henchmen chorused.

Did you receive that in a vision or was it revealed to you?