The noise is everywhere. Like heat. Dozens of cocks crowing. The voices of scores of men shouting above the loud, scratchy, amplified voice of the announcer. Only the two cocks in the middle of the ring are silent as they circle and jab, neck feathers fanned, blood beginning to stain their heads and shoulders. Friday […]
Where We Live
Dear Sergio: The Great Blue Heron flew over the house shortly before dawn this morning with its raucous announcement: the others will be returning to the tall dead trees in the swamp to begin the spring refurbishing of the nests…large constructs of dead branches lined with fine twigs and green leaves. “Remote, inaccessible situations are […]
Leaving
LEAVING Moving, slowly at first, a walk further than usual, earlier than before though not quite at dawn, a loose leash of daylilies at the ankle, then a night under Orion disappearing, each horizon a new mote in the eye. Moving along is how, looking back, I left.
Maple Syrup
ACTUAL GRACE The earth is beaten into dull stuff. A smudge of sun rides under the bellying sky. Winter is finishing slowly, like sap over a wood fire. At Phil’s Restaurant, breakfast customers hash over the Town Report. We still have our say. We still sing our annual hymn of republic and objection. Now while […]
The Quilt
THE QUILT The auctioneer turns her. The men wait on a corn planter and a wooden box of assorted nails. She is offered from the porch of her own house. We pluck at her skirt. What is she to me? I am waiting for that box of nails. What is she to me? The […]
The End
We talked as though we were strangers, side by side on the deck of a boat near Jeffrey’s Ledge on a summer Sunday; but the subject was familiar. We pulled in flashy mackerel, apricot squid, tossed them back. We hauled up dogfish; we caught the same ones over and over. They were heavy as […]
