Chum
Early this morning, our fishing buddy
slipped, inexplicably, over the deep
side of the boat, into the hollow
darkness of water—which wrapped him
with scarcely a splash.
He sank swiftly,
efficiently, out of sight,
like targeted
leaded bait.
After a water-logged wait
of eight hours, his body,
in sync with the new medium,
surfaced suddenly, beside the boat—at first
bobbing like a Styrofoam float, its line just
severed from a large
sounding fish.
Before we could reach him
with the gaff-hook, he began
drifting out, away from the boat,
buoyed by his own bloat, across
the sky-like lake, listing
slightly, as if tacking
spread-eagle against the breeze
under an invisible parachute.
Curious,
darters—shining in
late-afternoon
rainbow paint—have begun
to follow his wake, their pulsing
little oval mouths gulping
the aquatic oxygen
he could not breathe.
A snake now
gracefully S~s
through the long backwater
in the general direction
of his barely perceptible
mirroring ripples.
On the bank,
snapping turtles
extend their sensory
aquiline beaks,
in seeming
anticipation.
We must now
quickly
row out and retrieve him
before he can begin
to free-fall
forever
back down
into the lapping
opalescent depths
of his own
reflection.
It is unlikely
that we will ever
fully
understand.
**
Losing Control
I fired a shot at the sun, which had been
burning a hole in my head, all day
while I was trying to hunt. After all,
it was supposed to be cold. And, anyway,
it was only
a 30-aught-6 deer-slug load. But I guess
I got lucky. The bullet seemed to strike, dead
center, in Old Sol’s molten intestine.
A sun-spot appeared to rise, roll and
ripple out from the point of impact—spreading silent
shock waves of burnt-orange blood. For an instant
the sun became to me a distant volcano, spewing its angry
and knowing magma into the solar wind, through
the swift time of space, directly
toward my felonious, and now puzzled,
mind. In mere minutes
I felt the heat of projected plasma
surge in my brain—effect unknown—perhaps
for some time to come. Calming quickly, though,
the sun appeared to absorb the gut-shot, well enough.
I could soon tell no difference. “No real harm done,”
I told myself. “How silly of me.” I mean, really,
there’s no way I could have……Anyway,
relieved, I went on about my intended
ambush business, not worrying, continuing to
stalk my mostly helpless, grounded prey—which,
somehow, eluded me, this day. Well, okay, that’s
just the way it……But, suddenly, at the wane
of afternoon, I sensed the sun falter
slightly, shuddering momentarily, just before
it dimmed—sliding behind the horizon, finished
for the night. “It’ll be alright
tomorrow,” I mutter in self-solace. But what if it isn’t? What
if it’s worse than I think? What if it was seriously, maybe
even mortally, wounded by the stupid shot? What if it
doesn’t shine as brightly, or even rise—when,
in the early morning, I hold an anxious
eastward vigil? What will happen
to the world then, and to me? What
will they do to me, when,
growing uncomfortably,
irreversibly colder, they find out that
I did it—that I am guilty, albeit
unpremeditated, of solaricide?
These daylight-savings
winter nights
just seem
to last forever.
It is really
much too long,
from now until dawn,
to wait to find out.
**
Static
From silence
the music arrives, unannounced,
not requested. Gratuitous sounds
slip, by staccato, into the vacant
cloister of my backyard—from a party
down the block. At first atonal,
sharps and flats interchange
unpredictably—detaching,
rejoining—in varying waves
of the night wind. The tune
isn’t there. Then it is, but
still fragmenting, damping, as if
pressed through a cheap speaker
beside a car on a drive-in-
soda-fountain date.
The order cannot be rushed.
I wait for more melody,
piecing together, beginning
to carry. The notes within
steadily build. Defining relationships,
these tones start to sway in groups
like drunken dancers, caught in the emotions
of their newly discovered harmonics.
I am suddenly sure. We once
listened to the prophetic cliché of this
tear-in-the-beer song—“If I fall, please
let me down easy”—joined, temporarily, near
the trim neon borders of the over-sized
jukebox in the back-right-corner of the
roadhouse, off Hwy 25, going south.
Only that one
silly mistake…and…then……
But the music…again…begins to lose
intensity…retreating…disremembering
resonance…increasingly…breaking up…like
growing interludes…between…the
artless arpeggios…of some…progressively
fracturing marriage.
I’ll bet
you’re at that party tonight, a few
doors away, moving seductively
through the evening’s long
droning intoxication.
I’ll bet I know who……
The windows of that house
must just
have been closed,
because
now,
finally,
I hear nothing,
once again.
**
Trotline
I have awakened, splayed,
belly-bowed across the slender creek—face
to one side in the soft
silted wash. The current swirls around my
near-frozen ear and one
corner of my mouth. I try to rise
but my toes and fingers press
down like stubborn reeds
in the sucking mash of mud. Tiny
catfish pull at my belt loops,
trying to tug my guts deeper
into the mid-line
of the temporarily inflated flow. This is
silly. I am much too big to be
eaten by these little things, and
the stream is far too small
for proper drowning. I just need…to think…how…
I got here…I remember…clothes…hung out to dry…
by…the old…storied farm-house…the
line…sagging…under a current
of wind…and weight of
mottled towels…strung like fibrous
straps of liver, on bait-hooks, bobbing at the bottom
of imaginary carboys…the line, holding
for the moment… against the unseen river’s
relentless push. Before
entering the ragged woods’ edge…
I recall…the arcane coil…of greening copper…and
bright…new steam…condensing
in…predetermined drip…beside the timbered
slump of the barn…and inside…the spread
of rough-hewn hickory…the even line
of mason jars with their ethereal
corn fluid…cold and pale as the tongue
of a November moon flickering
on the barred pelt of a raccoon
nailed to a post in an almost
hidden break in the trees.
I must now
push myself up
from the supple
roiling sump, and,
repeating no steps, try
to find this secret
back-trail…threaded
somehow…through…the
broad needle…of so
many autumn haystacks…
finally…
back to home.
