Ty Underwear

Now when I was a young boy, at the age of five

My mother said I’s gonna be the greatest man alive

But now I’m a man, way past twenty-one

Want you to believe me baby; I had lots of fun

I’m a man

--“Mannish Boy,” Muddy Waters, 1955

Of course there’s nothing more manly than poetry.

Nobody’s ever said that out loud, I know, but it’s the truth. Somehow, poetry got a bad reputation—a symbol of the fabulous effeminacy of the deviant, a sign that someone was a little light in the loafers. Poor old Tennessee Williams was prohibited by his era from coming right out and claiming that Blanche Dubois’ husband was gay—so he wrote a script that described him as one who “read poetry.” When I went to college and majored in English, I could look around any given class and see nothing but women, because men majored in engineering and finance. No self-respecting man would ever study poetry. Men didn’t need to know the difference between an English and a Petrarchan sonnet; they communicated in blunt force—with simple words and grunts that conveyed straightforward emotion without all the frills of some 18^th-century pansy from England.

Of course, such nonsense fails to take into consideration how much true work it takes to craft really great poetry. The indolent effeminate could never create what the inimitable John Donne did, let alone the Neanderthal. To take the power and chaos of the human condition and craft it into a lyrical picture that stands eternal is the work of men. I have long considered a flair for the poetic to be among the manliest of virtues.

That’s why it was baffling to me that Ty Underwood didn’t share that appreciation for the lyrical when we were in the second grade. He was a tough guy: though we were only eight, he was well on his way to being a man’s man. His uncle was an important county judge, and the scandalous whispers around our town centered on his older brother, who had stabbed someone to death in the Mcdonald’s—despite the fact that his uncle was a judge! Ty was taller than the rest of us, with thick, curly black hair that sat atop his rectangular head like a piece of cold pizza, petrified from the air and devoid of life. His beady black eyes were drilled deeply into the top of his face, just underneath his flint-rock forehead, and the permanent sneer of cold command that spread across his lips struck fear into the hearts of us mere young boys. He was a man, already, as far as we were concerned.

Ty didn’t have much use for school at all. He was more or less perpetually angry, ether at his classmates or his teacher. He was the centerpiece of any confrontational drama that arose in Edison Elementary School; if there was a fight in the schoolyard, he was likely the pummeler to be feared. Once, in the middle of class, Mrs. Holland had caught him talking to his buddy. She had called him to her desk, and he’d grudgingly sauntered up, where he’d stood sullenly as she chewed him out for his behavior. As he turned to go back to his chair, he mumbled something defiantly under his breath.

“Tyler Underwood! Are you talking back to me?” Mrs. Holland’s voice rose slightly. Ty turned back around.

“No, ma’am.”

He turned back to his chair, mumbling again.

“You just let me hear you mumbling again, young man!” Mrs. Holland was almost yelling now. Ty continued mumbling, and the class gasped in horror. None of us could figure out why someone would openly defy the continental land mass of Mrs. Holland, and we held our breaths waiting on her to rain hell down on him.

But he continued to mumble, apparently unable to stop himself from defiance.

Mrs. Holland grabbed him by the shoulder and marched him directly out of the class to the principal’s office. The rest of us looked at one another in wonderment. None of us had ever imagined open rebellion before, and being in the presence of it was a little frightening. When she returned to class, none of us mumbled, I can tell you that.

But that’s just who Ty Underwood was. He was sullen, angry, and frightening. There was no poetry to his existence; just a blunt consistency that could be counted upon as certainly as death. He was a regular in that weekly rite-of-passage drama that unfolded after hours in every elementary school in America before the self-esteem nags got ahold of the culture and turned schools into Hug Zones and other such stuff. He could be counted on to mix it up with all comers: fifth-graders were afraid of him, though they were bigger. He and his small cohort were the official bullies of Edison Elementary, and the rest of us steered clear. The fights that took place in the schoolyard after 3:30 were announced by word of mouth in the student body early in the day, and they took place with punctual regularity—an unvarying iambic pentameter that marked the time of the school year by which students got their regularly scheduled beatings.

As I said, I considered myself more of a poet than a scrapper, so I always tried to stay on Ty’s good side—mostly by avoiding him altogether. The playground and the no-man’s land around the campus through which we had to walk to get home were Ty’s domain. In the classroom, though, Ty was a mere mortal. When Mrs. Holland called on him to read aloud, he would stumble over words and read with the cadence of Faulkner’s Benji—this gave me a secret satisfaction as I shot my hand skyward to show off my superior reading skills. When I was called on, I would read with the speed and alacrity of a man of letters, and steal a glance at old Ty to see if he was eating his heart out or not. When I wasn’t getting sent to the office myself for comic relief episodes, I excelled in the academic portion of second grade, and it was the only way I was ever going to win a victory over Ty Underwood. Such is the rhyme scheme of elementary school: those who rule the playground usually are subjugated in the classroom, and vice versa. Occasionally, even a superior academic like me forgets his place, though. 

It was bound to happen sooner or later. At some point in history, some successful carpenter, cabinet-maker or craftsman of some sort had taken the family name of “Underwood,” completely unaware of its eventual comedic ramifications in the 1970’s. Throughout the centuries, Ty’s descendants had plowed blissfully ahead in life, perhaps proud of their name and incapable of imagining the hilarious poetic implications that were wrapped therein. As far as I’m concerned, it’s no surprise that Ty’s older brother was stabbing people in the McDonald’s parking lot—with a name like “Underwood,” surely his life had already been spent on the defensive. So as I say, it was bound to happen sooner or later. Everyone must contribute a stanza to the poem of life, and 1977 marked the moment that my own creation came spilling forth from my innocent, lyrical heart.

It happened without warning, provocation, or premeditation. In the lunch line at Edison Elementary, mid-day, I expressed my deep appreciation for the natural lyric beauty of “Underwood” by creating a poetic nickname of my own:

“Hey Ty Underwear!”

It was as if time had stopped. The students who had been previously making the selection between Salisbury steak and celery surprise froze in mid-tray-slide. The lunch ladies, grim and stocky, linebackers in hair nets, halted their goop-slopping and turned their grimaces toward me. Even Mrs. Holland’s face swiveled around atop its turkey neck to stare bulge-eyed at me. Ty glared at me in that split-second of horrifying silence, then….

Laughter spilled out from the other students in the line. The lunch ladies went back to ladling generous helpings of steaming unidentifiables, faint smiles cracking across rotund faces. Mrs. Holland went back to watching others. The laughter crescendoed until it filled the lunch line. Soon, the entire second grade was guffawing and bellowing approval at the nickname. Within seconds, my poetic creation had immediately been appropriated by my classmates, who joyfully repeated it.

“Underwear! Underwear!”

I was quite pleased with myself, as usual. Every man has his duty to perform—a mission punctuated by his various gifts and abilities, designed to edify his fellow man on some plane. Mine was comic relief, and I had succeeded. I had created a genius comic nickname ex nihilo, and my efforts had been rewarded with uproarious laughter from my peers.

All except for one.

It turns out that Ty Underwood didn’t appreciate the poetry in that nickname. He stood glowering at me, breathing threateningly in slit-eyed rage, his chest heaving up and down as the laughter continued. Within a minute or so, the laughter subsided, but Ty was still glaring at me. The lunch line had again fallen quiet enough to hear his rebuttal, which was less lyrical than my own offering.

“If you say that again, I’m going to kick your butt.”

Now I don’t know how it goes where you’re from, but in Edison Elementary in 1977, “kick your butt” existed firmly on the profanity plane. We couldn’t imagine a more damnable indictment than to be caught with such language pouring from our mouths.  Everyone in that lunch line caught his breath at the sound of that threat, including me.

For my part, I was stung by the retort. The incongruous nature of the whole scene struck me as somehow tragic: I had created a mineable vein of poetic comic ore with “Ty Underwear,” and he had responded with a clunky, inartful threat that fell thickly on the quiet air and truncated the beauty of my own creation. But very hot on the heels of my own keenly sharpened aesthetic sensibilities, my next thought was fear.

I ducked my head in instant regret, humbly took my tray and went and sat meekly at my place on the long table in the lunchroom. I foolishly thought I could hide among my previously laughing compatriots, but they conscientiously scooted ever so slightly away from me on the bench.

Ty Underwood came and sat down right across from me, still glaring.

I swallowed hard and tried to keep my eyes on my food. He didn’t say a word for the rest of the lunch, and I daresay I didn’t enjoy a single bite of the Tuna Frito Surprise that had been unceremoniously glopped onto my tray. When lunch was over, we filed quietly back to class, and I looked furtively around for the protective hawk eyes of Mrs. Holland. By the time we had taken our seats in the classroom, it appeared the incident had died down, however. Ty took his seat across the room from me, and I sat down in my own seat, surrounded by less dangerous classmates. Some of them giggled in my direction, wanting to recreate the moment of hilarity in the lunchroom; I merely shook my head, trying as hard as I could to put some distance between me and the offending incident. As the class period commenced, it seemed as if the danger had passed completely. I was no longer afraid, and had now returned to my normal tendency to answer all of Mrs. Holland’s questions with comedic distraction. As long as I took Ty Underwood’s dire threat to heart, my butt would remain intact that day.

I wish I could report to you that my self-preservation instincts were as finely honed as my poetic and comic constitution. Though I may have seemed like a smart boy when called upon to read, that intelligence seemed noticeably absent in moments where the temptation to make others laugh reared its head. As Mrs. Holland called on Ty to read, there was a silence in the room that practically demanded to be filled with poetry. And before I could carefully weigh the consequences of that action, I heard myself answer that demand.

“Ty Underwear!”

Even as the words escaped my mouth, I knew I had created not just an eternal Whitman-esque song, but my own death warrant. My barbaric yawp was doomed to bury me beneath the rooftops of Edison Elementary’s playground. Ty’s eyes flashed with fire. His fist shot up and jabbed a thick forefinger across the room in my direction.

“That’s it. I’m kicking your butt after school!”

My classmates reacted with the obligatory exclamations, over Mrs. Holland’s exasperated sighs.

Ooooooooooh.

Aaaaaaaaaah.

You’re going to get it now.

I can’t believe he said it again!

Mrs. Holland looked sadly at me, then angrily at Ty.

“You’ll do no such thing. Now read!”

Of course, we all knew that Mrs. Holland held no sway in anyone’s lives after 3:30. Once that final bell rang, it was every poet for himself. Ty ventured one more threatening glare in my direction, then commenced his laborious reading. My stomach now resided near the tops of my tennis shoes, and my heart was pounding furiously. I began, too late, to seek a way of escape from my own talents. I briefly considered reporting myself sick to Mrs. Holland so that the office would call my parents and I could go home early. But I knew that the parents wouldn’t buy that story. I hoped against hope that Ty would become distracted by the herculean task before him of reading that simple paragraph, and then forget his sworn vengeance. But deep down, I knew that I had sealed my destiny that afternoon, and I would have no other choice but to engage Ty Underwood on his terms: the manly virtue of combat.

Only three hours remained in the school day, but they felt like weeks. I walked on tiptoe, hoping to minimize my presence on the earth. Perhaps if I could prove myself meek and humble, I could escape the wrath of Ty. I ventured some half-hearted innocent jokes that I hoped would make him crack a smile and give him some perspective on the unnecessary nature of his intended assault. Nothing worked. He sat and glared, for the remainder of the afternoon, and by the last half-hour of the day the energy level of the room had begun to amp up slightly.

Every student at Edison Elementary did his part in a fight. You were either a combatant or a spectator, and if you were a spectator your part was to stake out a place to form the obligatory semicircle around the combatants and cheer them on. It was bloodlust, plain and simple, and we were governed by it. As 3:29 became 3:30, the death-knell of the school bell tolled for me, and I walked heavily out to the schoolyard, now hoping to trust in my own speed to blaze past the fighting grounds and into no-man’s land so I could make it home.

The Mitchells are not known for their speed.

By 3:35, I was surrounded. Ty Underwood stood in front of me, looming like the angel of Death. My classmates, who earlier had guffawed in uproarious approval of my lyrical genius, now formed the circle of doom around me and began to cheer Ty on. I didn’t understand where the antipathy had suddenly come from, but I had bigger fish to fry at the moment—like dodging Ty Underwood’s first punch.

His left arm jabbed out at me like lightning, but somehow I feinted to my right and his arm punched air perilously close to my face. He had missed! I wondered if perhaps I could play this game in the same fashion for a few more minutes until someone came to break us up. But it was not to be; Ty’s next punch landed exactly where he willed it: square on my nose. I immediately fell to the ground, hoping that curling up in a fetal position would protect me from permanent damage. I longed for some grownup to see the commotion and come break up the fight. A more shameful showing in combat could scarcely be found than in my own paltry performance that day. Ty Underwood showed no mercy whatsoever, and proceeded to kick me in the head and the torso. Finally, after what felt like a full half-hour’s beating, I heard a car door slam nearby. I craned my head to the side to see who it was, and was immediately overjoyed to see my grandfather, Papa, getting out of his car.

The cavalry was here!

I suddenly felt a prick of shame in the deepest regions of my being—shame that was now redoubled in strength by the hope of adult intervention. I struggled to my feet, and Ty Underwood waited for me to do so. He looked over at my Papa, and the unruly mob ceased their hissing and mewling and looked at the old man. I ventured my own full glance at his direction, and he was leaning against his car with his arms folded, looking at me. He couldn’t have been more than ten yards away, and I felt confident that he could cover that ground quickly now that he saw his grandson in mortal danger. He opened his mouth to speak.

“Well hit him, boy!”

I stared at Papa in shock.

“Don’t just stand there. Punch him in the mouth!”

I looked back at Ty Underwood. He lunged at me, and I put my arms up for protection. There we embraced, both on our feet, evenly matched in the manly embrace of grappling. I was stronger than I had thought, and was able to stay on my feet and keep Ty at arm’s length as we moved in a circle around one another. This did not excite the mob at all, and they began to peel off and head to their respective residences. Only Ty, me and Papa were soon left.

“Are you gonna kiss him, or hit him?” Papa said, exasperated.

Ty and I looked at Papa, then at each other, neither of us releasing our grip on the other. I knew if my unbeatable opponent let go and swung at me, I would hit the ground in surrender, but he did not do it. He seemed somehow discombobulated by the old man’s presence, and simply maintained his grappling stance. Finally, Papa had had enough.

“Alright, girls, that’s enough.”

Ty Underwood let go of me. He shook his head disapprovingly at me, then skulked off. I picked up my books and trudged over to where Papa still stood. He opened the door for me and I slunk into the car, at once embarrassed and relieved. Our conversation about the incident was minimal.

“Boy, when you get in a scrap like that, the thing to remember is to hit back.”

“Yes, sir.”

The thing about grandfathers is that they love you even when you get your butt kicked. Mine had the decency to never bring up the topic for the rest of his natural born life after that moment.

I somehow lost track of Ty Underwood after that. I know we went to school together for several more years, but we never had dealings with one another again. For all I know, he may have ended up going into the family business of either stabbing or judging. I don’t picture him as the college type. But our adventure sat thickly in my own consciousness for years to come, a constant reminder of the harsh juxtaposition between the manly virtues of poetry and combat. It remains an epic poem without a heroic element—a stanza of free verse that ends, anticlimactically, with a bob and a wheel, rather than a stunning victory for the ages. He surely launched himself into many more and better fights than that one, so he may not even remember it.

And that’s the ironic justice of the incident. No one will really ever remember what happened on the playground that day, but wherever he is—perhaps doing a 25-to-life stretch in Huntsville, unwilling to read a story that is this many pages long—he will definitely remember my nickname for him. The only monument that stands in reflection of that epic moment at Edison Elementary is the poetry that cannot die. Like the inscription on Ozymandias’ statue, the poetry dares the mighty, manly ones to look with despair on what is truly eternal:

Ty Underwear.