My daddy wears sawdust
on his gray cap
and powders himself
with timber dandruff.

At night he walks,
across the soggy bottom;
pulls his shoes off,
sits barefoot on the porch

where he smokes,
drinks instant coffee, black,
and watches us catch lightning bugs
in fruit jars.

Behind him she rises,
that old haint, Sparks Ridge.
She looks over the valley to claim
the magic of his life,

a working man’s family,
to gobble us up
and take us down,
like oak tree roots,

take us down,
down, down,
down to her belly.

*first published in Other Voices International Vol.20