FROM DIRT A SOUL

her voice beneath him in the orchard was a murmur like a tumbling stream no words
clear but a soft cadence   no idea to whom she was speaking   either a ghost in the
trees or just conversation with self

he didn’t know   couldn’t without approaching her   down from the porch along the rutted
track into the ancient apple trees gnarled & tilting low

she probably wouldn’t hear him   alone on the chipped lichen-kissed marble bench
squatted there moons ago by an old man to honor a wife long gone   not dead but fled
in the arms of someone else   best friend once traitor later

she would be leaning forward he knew   eyes down as if somewhere in the dirt & leaves
was something mislaid or signs of things to come or just a beetle scratching in life

hidden behind a tree a day ago he watched her pluck a split brown locust hull from the
bark & view it as an alien creature driven from the earth in quest of something unknown
or unknowing

she had touched the shell with her tongue as if like igneous rock it would declare its
origin

her look was puzzled & when he stepped close she first didn’t notice then didn’t care
then asked if it was still alive somewhere

he said he didn’t know

but maybe it was one raising a rasp in pines along the edges of the tired orchard
seeking a rub of love

he looked long & hard at the ink in her skin   almost every visible inch
wondering again why & why the pain

& knew she wanted to be that locust

climbing from her skin breaking free leaving behind a dusky husk inked with runes
proclaiming i am gone don’t seek me don’t think you know me or want me

i am me

me alone

gone

MISTER SLICK

i liked that old man who camped out on a bench in front of the one gas station in our
little town / never knew his real name / called himself slick & my mama called him a sot /
told me to steer clear cause there was trouble there

but telling a boy such is tantamount to begging him to jump right in / especially when his
daddy is a button-up type afraid to drink a beer lest mama find out or worse her daddy
the baptist bible-thumper / all of whom would never be caught dead chomping a cold
cigar & having a sip of brown liquor in front of the world

for me slick was man of mystery / raving time & again about pirates but wasn’t sure he’d
ever seen the sea / knew for a fact a flying saucer had hovered over his head / might
even have summoned him up / had come face to face down in the swamp with
something only half human / once had a wife & a kid but couldn’t say where they were
now or when they left or exactly why / though there were wagging tongues could fill in
the gaps

not that i cared cause his words danced & sparked / were dark & thick especially when
he low sipped from a bagged bottle kept tight to his leg on orders of the proprietor who
didn’t want no old liquor-lapped fool or anything else hurting his business / already weak
enough in a ragged little town with not much left after the mill shut down / just a sad
place eating souls alive

slick didn’t mind none of that / content to sit & dialogue with whoever’d listen till the sun
went down & then wander back to a beat-down trailer hidden in piney woods / which
one night / curious / i crept close enough to hear somebody singing high lonesome &
surely hurting & forlorn

& that trailer from which he finally didn’t emerge one day & went into the ground without
much fanfare / not even a funeral & maybe not a prayer / forgotten

i found the hole humped with red clay / staked with a sagging wood cross & strange
enough one wilted rose / & just sat for a bit nothing to say but still hearing slick rant &
rave & knowing he was one of a kind in a place of ordinary / harking back to that one
thing he told me over & over to remember:

live a good long life & for every drink you buy know you get two back

Based in North Carolina, Gary Carter’s short fiction and poetry have appeared in such eclectic outlets as Nashville Review, Deep South Magazine, Steel Toe Review, Dead Mule, Real South and Read Short Fiction.

Forthcoming is a collection of short fiction entitled Kicking Dante’s Ass. His novel, Eliot’s Tale, is a reverse-coming-of-age road trip and love story dealing with things done and left undone. He also writes for print and online pubs, and sells a little real estate on the side. cartcomm11@gmail.com