100 Tricks Every Boy Can Do: A Memoir
Bret and Kim Stafford, the oldest children of the poet and pacifist William Stafford, were pals. Bret was the good son, the obedient public servant, Kim the itinerant wanderer. In this family of two parent teachers, with its intermittent celebration of “talking recklessly,” there was a code of silence about hard things: “Why tell what hurts?” As childhood pleasures ebbed, this reticence took its toll on Bret, unable to reveal his troubles. Against a backdrop of the 1960s — puritan in the summer of love, pacifist in the Vietnam era — Bret became a casualty of his interior war and took his life in 1988. 100 Tricks Every Boy Can Do casts spells in search of the lost brother: climbing the water tower to stand naked under the moon, cowboys and Indians with real bullets, breaking into church to play a serenade for God, struggling for love, and making bail. In this book, through a brother’s devotions, the lost saint teaches us about depression, the tender ancestry of violence, the quest for harmonious relations, and finally the trick of joy.
"1108832450"
100 Tricks Every Boy Can Do: A Memoir
Bret and Kim Stafford, the oldest children of the poet and pacifist William Stafford, were pals. Bret was the good son, the obedient public servant, Kim the itinerant wanderer. In this family of two parent teachers, with its intermittent celebration of “talking recklessly,” there was a code of silence about hard things: “Why tell what hurts?” As childhood pleasures ebbed, this reticence took its toll on Bret, unable to reveal his troubles. Against a backdrop of the 1960s — puritan in the summer of love, pacifist in the Vietnam era — Bret became a casualty of his interior war and took his life in 1988. 100 Tricks Every Boy Can Do casts spells in search of the lost brother: climbing the water tower to stand naked under the moon, cowboys and Indians with real bullets, breaking into church to play a serenade for God, struggling for love, and making bail. In this book, through a brother’s devotions, the lost saint teaches us about depression, the tender ancestry of violence, the quest for harmonious relations, and finally the trick of joy.
16.95 In Stock
100 Tricks Every Boy Can Do: A Memoir

100 Tricks Every Boy Can Do: A Memoir

by Kim Stafford
100 Tricks Every Boy Can Do: A Memoir

100 Tricks Every Boy Can Do: A Memoir

by Kim Stafford

Paperback

$16.95 
  • SHIP THIS ITEM
    Qualifies for Free Shipping
  • PICK UP IN STORE
    Check Availability at Nearby Stores

Related collections and offers


Overview

Bret and Kim Stafford, the oldest children of the poet and pacifist William Stafford, were pals. Bret was the good son, the obedient public servant, Kim the itinerant wanderer. In this family of two parent teachers, with its intermittent celebration of “talking recklessly,” there was a code of silence about hard things: “Why tell what hurts?” As childhood pleasures ebbed, this reticence took its toll on Bret, unable to reveal his troubles. Against a backdrop of the 1960s — puritan in the summer of love, pacifist in the Vietnam era — Bret became a casualty of his interior war and took his life in 1988. 100 Tricks Every Boy Can Do casts spells in search of the lost brother: climbing the water tower to stand naked under the moon, cowboys and Indians with real bullets, breaking into church to play a serenade for God, struggling for love, and making bail. In this book, through a brother’s devotions, the lost saint teaches us about depression, the tender ancestry of violence, the quest for harmonious relations, and finally the trick of joy.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781595341365
Publisher: Trinity University Press
Publication date: 09/11/2012
Pages: 256
Sales rank: 655,791
Product dimensions: 5.68(w) x 8.06(h) x 0.60(d)

About the Author

Kim Stafford is a writer and teacher living in Portland, Oregon. He is the founding director of the Northwest Writing Institute, a zone for exploratory writing at Lewis & Clark College. His books include Having Everything Right: Essays of Place , The Muses Among Us: Eloquent Listening and other Pleasures of the Writer’s Craft, A Thousand Friends of Rain: New & Selected Poems, and Early Morning: Remembering My Father, William Stafford.

Table of Contents

Prologue: The Trick 1

I Good Night

"Every night when we were small…" 5

No Gift 8

"Would it make you sad?" 13

Broken Top 15

"I never will marry" 17

Scuppers 18

"To thine own self" 19

"Give me your notebook" 20

Résumé 22

Bus Tag 27

"You can't buy this song" 27

"Do you ever hunt with a pistol?" 29

Woman RCMP 31

The Good Time 32

II GOD BLESS YOU

Poems for Grubia 37

Our Sky 40

Lost Words 42

Cheating Death 45

"Come on in" 46

The Indian Blanket 47

The Smartest Pet 48

The Lie 49

Rope in the River 52

Treasure Thief 52

Binoculars 56

Doctor Bret 57

We're Pals 58

The Wanderer 59

Wizard Falls 60

Two Birds with One Stone 61

Strawberry Fields 61

Four 64

Murder Bridge 65

Buying Frijoles 66

Shooting My Brother 67

Smoking Leaves 68

Ball of Fire 69

Uncle Miley 71

Rounds 72

Proud of Her Prow 75

Les Misérables 77

Sweet Little Gun 78

1909-s 79

Trick or Treat for UNICEF 82

Calculus 83

Crevasse 86

Ordeal 88

Super Duper 92

Reverend Jim 93

Darkness 97

"Did the world thank Uncle Bret?" 99

Our Road 100

"You said you would be home" 101

III Have Sweet Dreams

A Cornfield in Iowa 105

The Water Tower 109

Kester 115

Puritan Pleasures 117

The Road to Paris 126

One of the Silences 128

College 129

Lottery Night 133

Dodgin' the Draft 137

Carnaby Street 140

The Sweetbriar 141

Child of Luck 143

"I've asked my nephew" 144

A Week of Honey 145

Thirteen Cemeteries 145

Night Vigil 146

Dusk at Blitzen 147

"How about you, Mr. Stafford?" 150

The Wisdom of Insecurity 152

"I have your brother" 155

Twiggy at Big Camas 155

Folding the Tent 160

"You can't eat beauty" 160

IV See You Tomorrow

Path to the Sun 165

Haifa Good Thing 166

White Alice 167

Paris Rain 169

Talking Recklessly 170

Kuleana 174

Résumé of Failures 176

The Next Life 181

"What do you want?" 183

Crying Clothes 188

"It doesn't matter where you live" 190

Afterword: What Can We Trust But Memory? 193

Acknowledgments 201

From the B&N Reads Blog

Customer Reviews