Burr Dream
On the night of my dead brother’s birthday,
I dream his body has grown feet from his
belly. A ring of them, some protruding whole,
others a nub or somewhere in between.
They’re hidden under his shirt, and it’s only
when he’s home at the end of a hard day
in the fields that he frees them. It’s a gift
to me, to see his true self. They exist
to let him run faster than he ever could away
from the niggling uncle, the negligent father.
He is a man belittled daily, left to read
his westerns and dream of being the lone
man with a gun riding down the outlaws.
The rock star cheered on by fans.
In the dream, he was heavy again, not
the blanched 155-pound body he was
at the end. You couldn’t see the shape
of his bones or fingernails long with neglect.
Hale and whole, rice fields
behind him and something good on TV.
This Is the Classic Story
after a line by Eleni Sikelianos
A card table in the back room
of the Fish Shack where my brother
always tried to find the trick;
if he could beat the house, he could find
that piece that never fell into place
for him. Still living in our parents’ house,
he listened to music voraciously,
teasing out solos and quizzing
me so we could find the trick
together. He took me to my first
concerts, and we listened,
eyes askance, silently interpreting.
He worked as the manager at the Fish
Shack, fileting catfish or buffalo fish
however you wanted. Customers
could pick greens from our uncle’s
garden while they waited. My brother
cut fish with his head in the sky. He
was working on a mystery, listening
to a song no one else could hear.
Raised on a rice and catfish farm in eastern Arkansas, CL Bledsoe is the author of more than thirty books, including the poetry collections Riceland, The Bottle Episode, and his newest, Having a Baby to Save a Marriage, as well as his latest novels If You Love Me, You’ll Kill Eric Pelkey and The Devil and Ricky Dan. Bledsoe lives in northern Virginia with his daughter.