Hobble Creek Review
| Brent Fisk |
Headwaters
The Ohio moved past everything
I threw at it-- driftwood, heartbreak,
soda bottles, sticks.
There were days I dreamed
of swimming across it, a test.
But the barges carried those thoughts
down river. I'd watch pot-bellied men
cracked by the sun, cast out
their lines from flat rocks, slowly reel in
their silver meals.
Now landlocked and uncomfortably
safe, I move through the dry heat
of subdivisions, watch the flow
of soccer games. In dreams I still hear the river slip past:
the hiss of the breeze through sycamore saplings,
the ticking leap of grasshoppers in the scrub,
whole beaches of orange-winged butterflies
tonguing life from the muck.
The Ohio moved past everything
I threw at it-- driftwood, heartbreak,
soda bottles, sticks.
There were days I dreamed
of swimming across it, a test.
But the barges carried those thoughts
down river. I'd watch pot-bellied men
cracked by the sun, cast out
their lines from flat rocks, slowly reel in
their silver meals.
Now landlocked and uncomfortably
safe, I move through the dry heat
of subdivisions, watch the flow
of soccer games. In dreams I still hear the river slip past:
the hiss of the breeze through sycamore saplings,
the ticking leap of grasshoppers in the scrub,
whole beaches of orange-winged butterflies
tonguing life from the muck.
Brent Fisk has had poetry appear in Southern Poetry Review, Prairie
Schooner, Fugue and Rattle. He has received three nominations for The
Pushcart Prize. This is his second appearance here at HCR.
Schooner, Fugue and Rattle. He has received three nominations for The
Pushcart Prize. This is his second appearance here at HCR.
| Home / About / Masthead / Submissions / Contact / Current Issue / News / Archives |
