The poem:

Who Is Little Enis? by Jonathan Williams

Little Enis is
"one hunnert an' 80lbs of
dynamite
with a 9-inch
fuse"

his real name is
Carlos Toadvine
which his wife Irma Jean
pronounces Carlus

Carlos says
Toadaveenie is a eyetalyun name,
used to be lots of 'em
around these parts

Ed McClanahan is the World's Leading Little Enis freak
and all this information comes from a weekend in Winston
with Big Ed telling the lore of Lexington, Kentucky,
which is where Enis has been hanging it out for years and years,
at Boot's Bar and Giuseppe's Villa and now The Embers,
pickin' and singin' rockabilly style

Carlus ain't what he was
according to Irma Jean's accounts
(and even to his own):

he was sittin' there one night in the kitchen at home
tellin' stories and talkin' trash about Irma Jean --
with her right there with her hair put up in them pink plastic curlers --
about how these days how he likes to pop it to her dog-style
just now and again and how she likes it pretty damn well
when they wander all over the house
and end up in the living room corner --
"I'm just afraid Carlus will run us out the door and down the street
opposite the automatic laundry . . ."

The 9-inch fuse hung down Enis' right leg
is called, familiarly,
Ol' Blue

Ol' Blue used to be in the pink --
way in

Blue has a head on him like a tom-cat
and ribs like a hongry hound

and he used to get so hard
a cat
couldn't
scratch it . . .

but now that Enis has the cirrhosis
and takes all these harmones
Ol' Blue just don't
stand up like a little man
and cut the mustard
anymore

but Enis will smile and say
let's all have a drink, maybe I can drown thatthere liver of ours,
it's no bigger'n a dime nohow anymore, it just floats in there . . .

Hey, Blue, let's shake that thing!
Turn loose this oldie by my boy Elvis,
a golden oldie --
let's go, Blue!

And off they go
into the wild Blue-
Grass . . .

Carlos & Blue,
thinking of you . . .

hail & farewell! ( )