“Smoke Break,” “A Pinch of Brine,” and “I Eat Dirty”

The smoke runs thin

 by mid-morning

 

The river is once again

worth waking for

 

I approach the water,

spread my arms,

 

wade,

then rise

 

                  and between exhale

and the next flick of flame

 

I am, briefly,

the elusive kingfisher

 

father

has been looking for

all these years

No matter, Dad said,
pushing in the empty drawer
between two sun-stained
beds in a hotel room
on the harbor.

There’s always next year.

He threw open the French doors,
stepped into the west-heavy light.

A trawler blared, followed
by the low groan of skiffs
headed for the Sound.

The room filled with salt smell
so strong you’d have thought
the walls were sheathed
in ocean spray.

Dad looked back at me
and my sister and inhaled.

Smell that, kids?
That’s Heaven, we’re smellin’.
No doubt about it—

Heaven, and a pinch of Brine.

I was a wee boy

all bone no brawn,

as scrawny as a peapod,

mighty jealous of the way

father cared for his crops

with perennial love—

kissing the tomato’s tender bruises

and mourning the remnants of the lettuce

after the deer’s late-night dinner.

I was young,

not yet accustomed

to the ways we grieve,

so hearing him speak

of his own late father

with the cucumbers

was strange,

but how could I forget

that night stargazing

on the hill behind the house?

I was bewildered less

by the endless expanse

than his spiced flirty whispers—

He was talking dirty

to the chili peppers

when he thought he was alone,

crooning on about the way

they caught his mouth on fire.

“Baby, your heat is all I need,” he said,

 or something equally egregious.

And while

I was not interested

in dad’s hotness for the habanero,

I was convinced he loved his fruits

and vegetables more than me.

How he stood over them,

smiling as if his small plot of Earth

were sacred ground.

One summer day,

humid with scattered rain,

I called his name again and again.

Naturally, he was too busy

tending to his nursery,

whispering tenderly

to the blight on the leaves,

praying for the plants’ salvation.

I wanted to be blessed

by his whiskey breath, too.

I wanted to be just as beloved.

It was then,

as I watched him whistle

while he worked,

a grand idea sprouted

among my naive neurons.

I figured if I ate

straight from the womb,

where the roots took shape,

I too might grow into a life

worthy of his praise.

I filled up a plastic beach bucket

opened my mouth,

and turned it over.

You know what happened next, don’t you?

Yup,

I drank the Earth

as if it were a good

ol’ fashioned stout.

The thing about stouts, well,

they’re an acquired taste.

I spat mud and muck,

rock and rubble.

I swear even a few worms

slithered back up my throat.

Choking on tears, I shouted,

“Daddy, I eat dirt!”

He dropped his spade,

plucked me from the ground,

kissed my cheek,

and smiled

as he cleaned out his garden

from between my teeth.