~ Delta Poetry Review ~

Wambaw Creek

draped over the knobby knee
of a majestic cypress,
a cotton-mouth dozes
wrapped in a blanket
of cozy April sunshine

astride the far bank a young doe
hesitates, eyes us warily, spindly
legs on tremulous alert, nostrils flared,
before bounding off apace
through the swamp grove,

flushing a wild turkey
from its morning bath
amid the cat-o-nine tails
in a wild flail of wings

we, the intruders,
paddle ahead quietly,
feather oars with great care
to mask the ripples
of our trespass

Mama Jackson’s Sugar Shack

By repute, the coldest beer
and nastiest juke box
in the Santee delta, a pool table
to boot…how could I
possibly pass?

Sashayed in, white as
white on rice, daubed onto
a tableau of black – barrelhousing,
hooting Saturday night away
and a date with the Amen Corner
next morning.

Slapped a quarter on the side rail,
waited my turn, groovin’ on
Ivory Joe Hunter and, damn!,
wouldn’t you know, ran the velvet
straight off the break!

“You sho’ nuff shoot
a mean game, brother. Where
y’all from?”

“Ain’t never had brew this cold
where I’m from, my friend. Got me
some change if you want another pass.”
McLellanville, South Carolina

Old Man

Hunched on his stoop
he whittles at the hours,
strokes long, well-cadenced.
Time slows, the Carolina sun
hangs high spewing noonday heat.

A fly buzzes with menace,
pauses its raid to settle on the brim
of his floppy plantation hat.
A crusty hand rises, a perfunctory
swat and back to business.

Concentration deepens
facial grooves, furrows
etched by the silver blade
of a prejudice far older than he.
He doesn’t speak, his eyes
lidded, cast down.

Shavings of brown bark-skin
pirouette to ground, mounding
curlicued at his shoes crusted
black with bottom land mud.

The honed stick transforms -
bone white, smooth as a sliver
of fine African mahogany.