It is June. 2008. Fifteen miles north of New Orleans. The water logged signposts swell and sway in the damp mosquito heat. We hover over the murky waters of the bayou that birthed us. Gnarled cypresses hold their hands their heads forever. Our lines cut into their wrists, marked with neon blue party streamer. Our steel toed Wolverines echo and rattle in the belly of the bent and hollow sheet metal. The tags in our back pockets salivate, hungry to finish what the rifle will start. The motor idles, the way my grandfather drank himself into an elegy. The three quarter inch line is taut with a mass of teeth and scales.
Redux:
Trolling for Alligators with My Grandfather
June 2009. 15 miles north of New Orleans.
Like wraiths, we skiff across the womb that birthed us.
Gnarled cypresses dig their cuticles into the sweltering decades.
Our nylon livelihood nuzzles into their contortions.
Steely wolverines shiver in that belly of wrought sheet metal.
The tags salivate in their denim lairs,
hungry to finish what the rifle will start.
The blades idle, sputtering and wheezing,
the way my grandfather drank himself into an elegy
the bayou will never stop revising.
The three quarter inch high test line trembles,
quivers with promise, a mass of scales and fear.
Behind me, the panoramic lens understands all of this.
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