86 OxfordPoets 2010

II

A year later the new bridge went up. All clean cable and wire, so the cars could drive too fast and my boy and I couldn’t sit there, let the water pass.

As a kid, I’d rest on the splintered rail, protected in the strong shade of the Cyprus Pines, drop pennies or spit onto the frogs of Cow Creek back when it ran clear.

But they said a good car couldn’t cross it. So I guess the children who used to throw pennies, spit, had to find something new.

I can still see the old bridge, the pennies rusting in water.

III

Nowadays I don’t pass the creek much. There is no reason to walk my quiet boy across metal into Louisiana.

If the bridge I knew still stood maybe I could bring my boy down, tell him the lawn can wait. Tell him his father wants to pass the time, make him talk. But the bridge is not there any more.

And Falyssa’s bag of salted peanuts has run down, met the big river. That last thing of hers, heading out for the open ocean.