Life Story

 I sat at the table in the little house next to the creek that was also just beginning to thaw and wrote. 

Pye Dives for the Oarlock

Getting Baptized 

What I Left Behind  

Running 

Fishing With Mama

They made their way from memory to story and then I stopped.    

I pushed aside Life Story and went kayaking on the creek now completely thawed and filled with spot and sailboats fishing boats and swans and just a few jellyfish. When I started again I wrote in a tiny room

I could hardly breathe in that room.  

But I wasn’t there to breathe I was there to write.  

Back To Embudo  

Stephen Moves Into His Studio And I Get Drunk  

Mama Dies  

The Festival  

I added story like a child adding ornaments to an already full tree.  

Which was my favorite?  

Where did it belong?  

“I remember when I collected this one.”  

“I don’t care for that one any more but I cannot discard it yet.”  

Some had poetry.  

Some had pictures.  

Some even had recipes.  

Quince Preserves.  

NC Bar-b-queue.  

Collards.  

It was a feast.  

I fed bits of Life Story to friends  then to strangers who swallowed it whole and said  “May we have some more, please?”  

I gave it to them and went back to make more Life Story.  

When it was finished I sent Life Story on a journey with only a flimsy letter to keep it company.  

I was disappointed when Life Story came home with an even shorter rejection letter.