<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Men in the Susquehanna<\/strong><\/h4>\n

 <\/p>\n

Below the overpass, a dozen men<\/p>\n

are staggered like a mean bowling split<\/p>\n

across the shining flats. How can these men<\/p>\n

be here on a Wednesday morning, fishing for trout?<\/p>\n

Perhaps they\u2019ve taken the day off from work.<\/p>\n

Perhaps they don\u2019t have work.\u00a0 They gritted their teeth<\/p>\n

all winter long, but now they take up hope<\/p>\n

of plenty, fresh fillets on the grill or fried<\/p>\n

in popping bacon grease, a freezer full<\/p>\n

enough to last \u2019til spring turkey season.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Better to think of it as a holiday,<\/p>\n

the men luxurious in new waders,<\/p>\n

expensive flies and reels.\u00a0 They must hold rods;<\/p>\n

driving past, I only see their trunks<\/p>\n

dark and surely cold in April water<\/p>\n

that gleams like foil, these men who stand so still,<\/p>\n

waiting, terrified, to feel the catch<\/p>\n

of some great, unbearable hook.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Cute<\/strong><\/h4>\n

 <\/p>\n

The kitten curled at the sunny windowsill,<\/p>\n

fox in the back row, deer beside the door\u2014<\/p>\n

my fuzzy students are all accounted for<\/p>\n

in knitted caps, masks of eye, nostril,<\/p>\n

and whisker, pink in tuft and smile.\u00a0 They will<\/p>\n

not let themselves slip into fierceness, to roar.\u00a0<\/p>\n

A woman\u2019s life is terrifying: therefore<\/p>\n

these girls come dressed as owls, pandas, gerbils.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

It\u2019s safer to be a toy, a stuffed doll<\/p>\n

arranged like those on their narrow dorm beds.<\/p>\n

They clip fluffy tails to backpacks, peer<\/p>\n

at their shoes, their smeary notes.\u00a0 They try to recall<\/p>\n

that cozy den.\u00a0 If only this teacher, this blockhead,<\/p>\n

would cease her droning into their furry ears.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Men in the Susquehanna   Below the overpass, a dozen men are staggered like a mean bowling split across the shining flats. How can these men be here on a Wednesday morning, fishing for trout? Perhaps they\u2019ve taken the day off from work. Perhaps they don\u2019t have work.\u00a0 They gritted their teeth all […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3851","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/ducts.sundresspublications.com\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3851","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/ducts.sundresspublications.com\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/ducts.sundresspublications.com\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ducts.sundresspublications.com\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ducts.sundresspublications.com\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3851"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/ducts.sundresspublications.com\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3851\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3855,"href":"http:\/\/ducts.sundresspublications.com\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3851\/revisions\/3855"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/ducts.sundresspublications.com\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3851"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ducts.sundresspublications.com\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3851"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ducts.sundresspublications.com\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3851"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}