A Poem Is a Naked Person

What the trade is.

They tell me to run the store, do this or do that.

Fuck, this deal out here...

is just kind of a floating mental hospital.

Mm-hmm.

- You're getting your picture took! - We are?

- See you on the TV! - We all gonna be on TV?

- Peace! - Great!

You catching any fish?

- What? - You catching any fish?

- We're not fishermen. - Oh.

We're just pleasure seekers.

What are you building here?

- You're gettin' your picture taken! - A recording studio.

Oh!

Leon Russell's recording studio.

Well, I'll tell you one thing about Leon Russell.

The first day he moved out here, why, his hat —

The wind changes up here.

I call this the trade winds out here.

You know, he was born in Oklahoma.

- A-Any — - He's really an Oklahoma boy.

Anyway, he had on his big top hat...

and the wind changed and blew it up the hill.

He like to have lost his hat. It blew up the hill, not down the hill.

What did you used to do here?

We run Pappy Reeves's fishing dock for him.

Catered to the public, you know, rented cabins...

took care of the fishing bait outfit...

this, that and the other.

Then when Leon came, why...

he didn't have the fishing dock anymore...

so we took care of Leon and his musicians.

And what kind of work did you used to do before you retired?

- Well — - We found state hospital work.

- For 15 years. - Fifteen?

- Well, I — - Well, we retired after 15 years' service.

Well, I retired after 44 years of state hospital work.

And what kind of work did you do at the state hospital?

Just tenants.

- I worked maximum security wards. -

Well, the first time I saw Leon, I like to have come unglued...

'cause he had long hair and I wasn't used to it.

What do you think about long hair now?

I love it! My husband's been growin' it, and I'm fallin' in love with him again.

- - 'Cause he's got long hair.

I figure that's everybody's their own business.

I know, but you look awful cute with your long hair.

Do people ever make fun of you for your long hair?

No. If they did, why, I'd get 'em told.

Well...

I'll tell ya —

Where's the rest of the band, by the way?

I tell you what. We did an audition for this job, you see.

We really didn't know any more songs. We didn't tell them that when they hired us.

But, uh...

right now I'd like to, uh...

sing you a song from the Hank Williams catalog.

- Y'all know who Hank Williams is, don't you? -

It's just awful hard to sing when George Jones is in the booth.

- Wow. Thank you. - How about a little armadillo? There you are.

Can my lady friend here —

- I ain't gonna sign her! -

- Get my back. - On the back!

- Turn towards me. - Okay.

Do a little of "Take Me," George.

"Take Me" would be a real pretty song, boy.

Ol' Willie Nelson's listened to you a lot, hasn't he?

I think people should make their own paintings.

Decorate their own houses and do all that.

Otherwise, what are they gonna do in it?

That's why I never could get real comfortable in a new house.

Because, uh, it's finished.

You know, you come in and sit down, what are you going to do?

You know? You can't get up and work on the door. It's already finished.

What you can do, the way they finish houses now, they paint 'em white.

They paint them blank colors.

And they're excellent surfaces to paint on.

And if they don't like it, they can always paint over 'em.

But people are afraid to disturb that — that surface.

They'll even spank their kids for painting on the wall.

"Oh, no! No! Our new wall!"

That's what the wall's for, you know?

The kid knows what it's for, you know.

Otherwise, he wouldn't draw on it.

It's the most obvious place.

And people who do let their kids draw on their walls...

usually wind up with an artist in the family.

You know? Because most kids draw.

I mean, they just do.

That's — That's a good way to find out there whether —

whether it's, uh, something man has just picked up over the years...

or something he was built in with.

I think it comes, you know, as part of the standard equipment.

And a lot of people are walking around with an incredible amount of painting ability...

and they just never did do it because they got scared by it once...

or someone told them they couldn't — they weren't doing it right.

Which is absurd! It's absurd!

How you gonna say which painting is done right?

Ask Picasso. You know? "Which painting did you do right?"

They all look fucked up.

You know?

That's the way he wanted them to look.

He wanted them to look fucked up, like the mind is.

You know? It's crazy! The mind just is —

Professor So-and-so went into this primitive tribe...

and they found these very unusual artifacts...

that were produced by this miraculous — miraculous —

miraculously produced by this "primitive" group, you know.

How could they possibly produce anything like that...

if they weren't as brilliant as a goddamn camera?

I mean, that's like saying a butterfly is dumb.

I mean, that's —

If you could look anything like a butterfly...

all your friends would say you were brilliant!

You know? Really!

"Oh, look at that outfit!" You know.

"They must really have something on the ball."

That's why people like to look and dress — and they dress up, you know — Clothing!

Homer's gonna be a movie star, don't you think?

I want you to take me skin diving, show me how one of these days though.