Just too Beautiful and Too Unwise
by Charles Case
John H. Pierce's Son-in-law

Forebearers are all to be honored. However, the fame

Or lack thereof, or commendabilty, or shame,

Time erases all the grist of pain we may feel

Relative to their faults or foibles in recorded pages.

For with tranquility and equanimity, we yet love

The Truant in the Family Tree.

As part and parcel with those of virtuosity

As the immortals in our destiny.

One such immortal, John Harwood Pierce, father of Stella,

Civil War soldier, Buffalo Bill Cody Indian fighter,

Inventor, writer, ordained minister, famed for multiple marriage

And himself married many. Jennie was the fifth.

She was just too beautiful and too unwise.

When out of the family fold and in Oakland visiting

Succumbed to the charm of the multiexperienced older man

Who was not a free man to be married.

"Oh what a web of lies we weave

When first we practice to deceive."

Caught in that web so often is sorrow.

This one named Jennie with the light brown hair.

What a checkered story we read in the archives.

Along with military records, are those of marriage.

In these marital chronicles are five marriages

With no erasure of one - Jennie was without validity.

When the old soldier died, his pension went to the other.

Pittance though it was, it would have helped her through

And more, the banner of pride would still stand high.

When it no longer flew, she was crushed.

She was just too beautiful and too unwise.

Jennie floats in memory as one loved dearly

One you couldn't stop (like in a dream)

From stepping on the railroad tracks to misery.

This poem was written in early 2000 shortly after Charles and Stella (b. Pierce) Case received from their daughter Barbara photocopies of records from the National Archives concerning Stella's father. After reading the quarter-inch-thick stack of documents, Charles Case was moved to write this poem in memory of John and Jennie Pierce.

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