Old Roads, New Stories: A Literary Series
The Housepainter’s Story
Since he works with invisible paint,
he knows complaints are part of the bargain.
They go outside to check the mail,
and the house seems gone behind them;
or they park out front along the curb,
and nothing’s there—just a view
from the car to the garden…
The housepainter knows not everyone’s a fan.
Most come around, though, once they notice
their walls are all sightlines,
once they see that their roofs are like sky again,
nothing in the way. And now, look:
The mountains are returning,
stepping closer to the edge of the city.
And the buildings—those rectangle blinders—
have disappeared.
The Quilter’s Story
These aren’t blankets you can sleep in.
No, they’re too weird.
And they’re plastic. Like botches
stitched by Frankenstein. And huge,
even for Godzilla’s shower,
if shower curtains are what they are.
You could ask him, “Hey,
what’s the deal here?”
but you won’t get any answers.
Artists prefer to work in vision, skip the words.
Plus, he isn’t really quilting.
This is just a boat in the ocean.
And whatever he’s pulling from his nets,
it isn’t fish.
The Pilot’s Story
It’s just what she did now:
put on her headset and go
because so-and-so’s got some pasture
and she’s got a plane, a couple of helicopters.
We’re living in a fire-world, flames
lacing their way around snow, exploding
up ridges in the summer,
no more air, all the oxygen eaten.
On the ground below her, the crews keep at it,
but what can they do about the end,
when rain is just something
students learn about in History…
and math…
and how to dial their locker combination?
She lays down suppressant on the worst of it,
dumps water borrowed from the reservoir.
Then she air-lifts elk to that dairy farm.
As many as he’ll take.
The Suncatcher’s Story
Let them all try to say, “That’s not a job”;
the girl can still see:
how houseplants
turn toward the windows,
how a horse will roll
to get the warm in deeper,
how the ocean’s like her hands
when she makes a cup—hers
to lift a hermit crab, and the ocean’s
to catch more light
so the kelp beds grow
and that underwater forest dances green.
Let them call it a Career-Day name—
say “photographer,” or say “farmer,”
say, “What do you know about asparagus, honey?”—
she’ll just smile.
Which is also like catching the sun. A quick gift,
even for the ones who’ll never see.
Read an interview with Rob Carney appearing in Terrain.org: “The Ocean is Full of Questions.”
Read Rob Carney’s Letter to America in Dear America: Letters of Hope, Habitat, Defiance, and Democracy, published by Terrain.org and Trinity University Press.
Read poetry by Rob Carney appearing in Terrain.org: 6th Annual Contest Finalist, 4th Annual Contest Winner, and Issue 30. And listen to an interview on Montana Public Radio about The Book of Sharks.
Header photo by Ralphs Photos, courtesy Pixabay.