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By Jack Joseph Smith

FLETCHER 3 The Father of Missouri is willed The Father from Missouri is wild The Father from Missouri went To OREGON and the father has come Indeed across thE splendor spilling on the blood gown Yes, above, and sometimes below all beginnings; ANd ENdiNgs Thrust them out with fist GrAss We need no sign barrer to catch our tonque's in the splash Lash out the weed for ANothEr sALvAgEd frAMEd The Father again is tired of listening wooden farm He is the Man, and he believes in action No spark on the end of whiskey will ever make him quick to forget He has already moved No cus can crawl or crouch or call For no helplessness exists, when your damm leaning on the seed O, that lousy breed that Don't say it REAlistATE EYES A MAN's worK Want to see lightening struck Just yell sex and make it rhyme And that T.V. don't have antlers like thE deer that's whispering through your glass... and Mr. Narrow fears the windswept storm Right about sound that Narrow is But wingless for his comprehention FLEtchEr Don't bless the safeguard's for flying HE let thE cup run dry ANd Touch AS nothing whilE nature fills it for hiM Hog cheep is dirt But it takes alot of space to pLow HE Forgot sleep Don't eat meat whilE At wAr with MEN HAd A foot drEAM About A fiNAlly bustEd toE Begat, begin wEN on LoNgiNg for youth Turning stones to mud CrowEd like a wound and then AtE it alive And what grows by the bank of the river is where HE always iS I couldn't care less If? you were dead replied the American Eagle his And then in whisper with wind Ever though my master will be you

Original Scan

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AI Interpretation

GPT

The revised poem describes a forceful father from Missouri, then addresses Narrow and Fletcher through warnings about nature, work and war. Handwritten notes add real estate, a man's work and a dream about a busted toe before the American Eagle's final reply.

The writer revises commands and images on the page, changing who acts and who receives the warnings. The eagle's response introduces a speaker other than the father, but the unresolved his and with annotations leave the ending's grammar open. The restored revisions do not justify treating the father's portrait as a verified biography.


Claude

'FLETCHER 3' opens 'The Father of Missouri is willed / The Father from Missouri is wild' and builds a portrait of 'the Man' who 'believes in action', with hand insertions such as 'REAlistATE EYES / A MAN's worK', a second section on 'Mr. Narrow' and 'FLEtchEr', and a closing exchange in which 'the American Eagle' replies 'Ever though my master will be you'.

The many insertions keep the poem in draft form; LoNgiNg and CrowEd are provisional readings of short hand additions.