Whose hobgoblins now? These are the old-time base of the brain beliefs winched up from the deepest well of what we are, broken stumps tangled with tupelo roots & the kind of mud that can talk to ghosts, in king snake, magpie, & harm. It’s a wild world, & this is its first parade. Three men stepping creole through a Louisiana swamp playing a feral march music like a swarm of bees. Neutral is a nothing word. They are already here, they are already coming, that’s your ass, on the road ahead. Step heavy. Perched in a fork of a dead cypress tree a screech owl shrieks into flight. When sundown settles, & the fires break out their scratch & start to feed.
Jeffrey Little | Gone Contents | Mudlark No. 47 (2012)