Hobble Creek Review
| Kelly Madigan Erlandson |
Black Duck
There is a day like a cathedral
made of wax, a day when the low flying planes
make you think of warfare, of Blitzkrieg,
of ruins. Or sometimes they make you
think of cartoons you watched in childhood,
the smart aleck rabbit too cool for death,
the long stick of a rifle threaded down the hole,
but trickster is standing by the tree behind the hunter.
May we all be; may we all get to look
over the shoulder as someone takes aim.
May we all learn the fox trot, cross our legs in repose,
ride the tricycle with the oversized front wheel.
There is a woman sweeping her wooden porch.
She is listening to the radio.
She mouths the words to these old songs.
She doesn't hear the planes.
A man pretending to be a cowboy
sings about the range.
He is staying in the best hotel in town.
He is taking surfing lessons.
See a woman
with a packet of letters
and a match. There is a rolled up carpet
by the street. She has emptied
her rooms of everything
except one chair with a broken leg.
There is a black sputtering duck
in a pan on the stove. Steam is rising
but he is still negotiating,
he is placating,
he is getting warmer.
My stomach
cannot stomach this. He is not real
and I am worried about his temperature.
Tactically speaking, I am worried about
how he will get out of the pan, of the freezer,
of the trap. I am worried because
I have never seen him fly.
Another Word for Leaving
There is smoke rising.
There is a circle made from the bark of trees.
There is deer scat
scattered among the new blades
of switch grass. There is a small wedding
under a magnolia tree, there is a scent
memory of moss hanging from the live oaks.
There is a bee too early for the season.
Every last surface fretted with pollen,
I walk out anyway. At the muddy bank
I rip the hem away from my skirt
and feed it into the water. Don’t waver
or turn back. We must do these things
while we still can, while
our mothers are alive, while the road
is still dark. The route is marked by pages
torn from textbooks, marked by lace,
marked by abandoned cars.
In the back seat of the Ford Galaxie
a young boy sleeps in a nest of blue rags.
Even if you lifted him
you could not save him. Like everyone
he has to save himself.
There is no rescue. Remember
the space under the dock,
the smell of wood and algae,
the way we surfaced exactly
between above and beneath,
how I kissed you and said I didn’t,
the shadows of big fish moving beneath us.
Later the engine wouldn’t start
and you used a long pole
to push us across the lake
in the wooden boat. Remember my silver
bracelet that slipped away,
how I dove under over and over
to find it. The man on the dock said
a meteor had fallen into the lake
when he was young, a sizzling sound
that boiled up for hours after. I walk
the edges of craters now for a living,
I sit at the spine of the continent.
I plan to strap on scuba gear,
breathe artificial air.
You are invited to meet me
in my father’s cave. Extinguish all light.
There will be stairs at first,
and a railing you can hold, and afterward
you can follow the sound
of water, the sound of breathing,
the sound of a million bats
awakening, their thin wings
another word for leaving,
another way to say ground cloth,
a bandage, a tarp to throw
over the past, an uncapped well.
Meet me there and bring a musical
instrument. Bring bread.
Meet me there on the first day of April.
Meet me and I will tell you
what you have been asking me for years.
Gloam
There is a wheel
in the world
green with lichen
and wet with blood
and semen.
Fish spawn in the shallows
and the badger
rots on the bank.
My children
are typing their messages
and driving late into the night
while time pounds her feet
over and over
on the compact clay.
Loss
does its damp
unfurling.
There is a day like a cathedral
made of wax, a day when the low flying planes
make you think of warfare, of Blitzkrieg,
of ruins. Or sometimes they make you
think of cartoons you watched in childhood,
the smart aleck rabbit too cool for death,
the long stick of a rifle threaded down the hole,
but trickster is standing by the tree behind the hunter.
May we all be; may we all get to look
over the shoulder as someone takes aim.
May we all learn the fox trot, cross our legs in repose,
ride the tricycle with the oversized front wheel.
There is a woman sweeping her wooden porch.
She is listening to the radio.
She mouths the words to these old songs.
She doesn't hear the planes.
A man pretending to be a cowboy
sings about the range.
He is staying in the best hotel in town.
He is taking surfing lessons.
See a woman
with a packet of letters
and a match. There is a rolled up carpet
by the street. She has emptied
her rooms of everything
except one chair with a broken leg.
There is a black sputtering duck
in a pan on the stove. Steam is rising
but he is still negotiating,
he is placating,
he is getting warmer.
My stomach
cannot stomach this. He is not real
and I am worried about his temperature.
Tactically speaking, I am worried about
how he will get out of the pan, of the freezer,
of the trap. I am worried because
I have never seen him fly.
Another Word for Leaving
There is smoke rising.
There is a circle made from the bark of trees.
There is deer scat
scattered among the new blades
of switch grass. There is a small wedding
under a magnolia tree, there is a scent
memory of moss hanging from the live oaks.
There is a bee too early for the season.
Every last surface fretted with pollen,
I walk out anyway. At the muddy bank
I rip the hem away from my skirt
and feed it into the water. Don’t waver
or turn back. We must do these things
while we still can, while
our mothers are alive, while the road
is still dark. The route is marked by pages
torn from textbooks, marked by lace,
marked by abandoned cars.
In the back seat of the Ford Galaxie
a young boy sleeps in a nest of blue rags.
Even if you lifted him
you could not save him. Like everyone
he has to save himself.
There is no rescue. Remember
the space under the dock,
the smell of wood and algae,
the way we surfaced exactly
between above and beneath,
how I kissed you and said I didn’t,
the shadows of big fish moving beneath us.
Later the engine wouldn’t start
and you used a long pole
to push us across the lake
in the wooden boat. Remember my silver
bracelet that slipped away,
how I dove under over and over
to find it. The man on the dock said
a meteor had fallen into the lake
when he was young, a sizzling sound
that boiled up for hours after. I walk
the edges of craters now for a living,
I sit at the spine of the continent.
I plan to strap on scuba gear,
breathe artificial air.
You are invited to meet me
in my father’s cave. Extinguish all light.
There will be stairs at first,
and a railing you can hold, and afterward
you can follow the sound
of water, the sound of breathing,
the sound of a million bats
awakening, their thin wings
another word for leaving,
another way to say ground cloth,
a bandage, a tarp to throw
over the past, an uncapped well.
Meet me there and bring a musical
instrument. Bring bread.
Meet me there on the first day of April.
Meet me and I will tell you
what you have been asking me for years.
Gloam
There is a wheel
in the world
green with lichen
and wet with blood
and semen.
Fish spawn in the shallows
and the badger
rots on the bank.
My children
are typing their messages
and driving late into the night
while time pounds her feet
over and over
on the compact clay.
Loss
does its damp
unfurling.
Kelly Madigan Erlandson is the author of Getting Sober: A Practical
Guide to Making it Through the First 30 Days (McGraw-Hill, 2007). She has
been a licensed drug and alcohol counselor in Nebraska since 1983. Her
poems and essays have appeared in Best New Poets 2007, Crazyhorse,
The Massachusetts Review, and Prairie Schooner. She was awarded the
Distinguished Artist Award in Literature from the Nebraska Arts Council
in 2006, and a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship for 2008.
Guide to Making it Through the First 30 Days (McGraw-Hill, 2007). She has
been a licensed drug and alcohol counselor in Nebraska since 1983. Her
poems and essays have appeared in Best New Poets 2007, Crazyhorse,
The Massachusetts Review, and Prairie Schooner. She was awarded the
Distinguished Artist Award in Literature from the Nebraska Arts Council
in 2006, and a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship for 2008.
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