sometimes the grass sometimes the wild flowers it gets cold in the woods so cold the water cold the sky of the night time i dreamt of the wolf again last night running thru a green field of corn the taste of it was so sweet it almost hurt my tongue dillinger sez go home sonny & i tell him it’s hard to think abt that my daddy liked to whip me good i wdn’t tell johnny the other things he did but then i get to thinking he won’t be there anymore not so i cd see him & i can go home for this one time i can go home for mama’s funeral used to sing fetch my funeral clothes i’ll be coming on home death’ll be waiting on the front porch to see me death’ll be cracking bones in that busted up chair sometimes the grass some times the wild flowers waving in the wind down by otter creek mama stands by the lightning struck oak with a red rose in her hand Johnny sez it’s ok we’ll go home together & he drives all night because the dark talks to him just a like bro ther the dark of the trees & the hills & i tell him abt how i used to get scared of the dark & have to hide under the covers in my room i’d take a jack knife with me then it wd be ok til some nights when my father got done chasing his demons with a big stick out in the corn he’d come to my room & hold out his hand & say shut that knife up boy cuz i ain’t gonna hurt you he scared the wolf when he went out into the corn with his stick & he scared me & i never told Johnny any of that part because i wd only go so far remembering & then it wd get me to shaking in the dark & the dark in the dark johnny sez re member this town we’re driving thru first nation al bank on the corner the teller she smelled just like mama’s lilacs i found a snake un der the bush where the purple was darkest a timber rattler up from the field mama got it with her hoe & i never told cuz of the way she looked she had her teeth showing when she chopped it in half holding a rose down by otter creek under that oak & she never sd nothing the rose was her talking & the money smelled of lilac when she gave it to me when she gave it to Johnny he sez a helluva take & the night is watching is always watching the grass & the flowers & just a little way down otter creek where my mama stood holding that rose a kid drowned i saw him go under & for a second all i saw was his hair & i Jumped in but as not good at diving went down just as far as i cd i. think i touched his fingers i touched something that felt like his fingers maybe it was the side of a catfish or an old drowned man’s face which was bone smooth as the skin or maybe i touched death’s hand which was waving me under waving me down as deep as the tree roots & catfish caves where the indian bones sleep the talk of the grass the cry of the flowers tell ing johnny i didn’t mean to kill that cop in blue sky but he id’d you & was drawing his pistol dillinger smiled the night sticking like meat to the dark places in his teeth didn’t mean to do it johnny fired over the roof of the car & he put his hand to his throat like he swallowed something he cdn’t spit or choke out it wdn’t come & his pistol dropped away i re member the way it went around in the air like a funny lethal top & then sailed off in the grass & the cop was sitting in the weeds when we drove off & the little wild flowers had blood on them mama holding that rose like it was a piece of her blood it made me think she was saving me a slice of the moon like when it gets so red & the corn is down & there is no earthly place for the wolf to hide he didn’t get as scared as i did he had big teeth & he knew how to use them but most of all he knew how to get away how to find the red darkness & go way back in the big red damaged moon i cd crawl into & sleep there in that rocking in that light & that blood & some of the lakes that dillinger drives past has the moon on them the wrinkled moon floating along on the top where the water goes out & someone in a boat is talking & if we pull over & stop i can hear the voices coming from the boats as tho they are talking to the trees to the water to the stones on the shore to the dark crammed way back & deep inside them dillinger sez when’s the last time you wrote to yr ma like he knew her he never met her but he talks like he did & i think if he met her he wd’ve liked her i know she wd’ve liked him because of his joking ways his walk how he wore his hat she al ways used to tell me sonny if you go to robbing banks like i almost know you will you’d better do it so good they never cotch you she liked to use the word cotch because her daddy talked that way he rode with nathan bedford forrest & she still had her daddy’s gun she used to say you wanna look at a horse pistol it was so big it took two hands to hold it tho she cd wrap one big meaty fist around its wooden handles she used to shoot at hex signs on the barn & her bullets wd go into them every time when she missed she’d say goddamit & then put one hand over her mouth like she’d wounded her self she’d cut her hand once with a butcher knife & never sd a damn thing when the blood came get me down those burying clothes & i shake the dirt out & put them on flower in her right hand horse pistol in her left & she cd ride wd crawl right out thru her bedroom window smack onto the horse’s back when she was fifteen & her daddy wd take the buggy whip to her for going off with lewt slang for lewton he’ll do you no good the old man wd say but did she listen the rose hand bent all the way across her death smells of roses i long to swim in the fumes i remember my daddy’s shotgun which i never had any use for because the barrels were so fat & long mama what did death look like when he came up on the porch & asked for yr hand & when he didn’t get that a drink of ice cold water somebody yelling tornado & the grass smelled so green i cd’ve gone to sleep in it & in the green green air the funnel dipped out of the black clouds fell out like a black thread out of a man’s trousers i saw a barn go up & a tractor & a piece of a house & a two by four came right at me & turned just right missing the side of my head i thought i was done for sure as hell amazing grace wd come floating out over the corn field where the wolf used to hide the sound of it going right over him the wind in his fur the corn the wild flowers the grass i re member the way way it wd catch mama’s hair & make it go wild all over her it was so long some nights i thought i cd hide in it hide from my father who wd come up the stairs the way death came up on the front porch courting my mama death had a secret way of hiding his pecker among his bones so no one cd see it & he had a good voice he used to sing in a high tenor voice sing you are my sunshine sing red river valley so sweetly the wolf wd come out of the corn but mama knew what he was up to knew he was not to be trusted knew he was nothing but was a sweet talking son of a bitch on wheels & she’d wait with a butcher knife a russell green river the same one her grandaddy gave her after gutting a deer lost in the green of the flowers & grass down by sweet otter creek that drowned boy’s blood makes it taste almost like sugar but it’s a smoky sugar taste that smacks of dying around turtle shells & catfish gills they’ll know who you are johnny you can’t go to the funeral he wears the 45 under his suit coat asks does it show much nobody’s gonna be looking he’s smoothing his hat brim his reflection goes so far inside the mirror it looks like he lives in another country i can taste the silver of his darkness where it is swimming the bullet went thru my coat & took off some of the skin on my side dillinger sees it & yells at me flesh wound later i scrub it off in front of the mirror my skin looks so white dill inger sees it sez you gotta get a little more sun boy pours some bootleg on it to cauterize the wound ruined my dark funeral coat dillinger sez all clothes are death clothes with the take from the bank you can always buy new the wound covers an old scar my father’s buggy whip gave me i never told no one but i think mama knew sez they call em horse pistols cuz they was worn on the saddle make em easy to reach i saw a guy shot right off his horse down by the creek he’d just robbed the farmer’s state bank & was comen down at a gallop the posse cotchen up got em where the weeping willow stood the one you chopped down the stump’s right there winchester it was he went clean off           the back of that horse & rolled like a full sack a feed ended up a coupla feet from me those boys a pologized all over the place because i was just a little girl maybe six or seven never’d seen anything killed but a pig throat slit in the hogyard they kicked him face up & there was a red mark where the bullet had passed thru i told my dog not to look but he was a dog & looken was good & that night death came up on the back porch & sang so fine even the wind stopped blowen for awhile even my daddy heard it & went out with his horse pistol the moon shinen off somethen maybe it was bone i don’t know why the grass gets so green & smells so good when it gets cut mama wd get out there with her big tent dress on it was covered with flowers & soaken with sweat & mow the yard just like a man she was just as big as a man & she’d carry fifty pound sacks a feed by one hand the muscles bulging up in her arm she’d just look at me & say somebody’s got to do it the old man’d be off curled up with a bottle of rye whiskey some place & nights mama wd study him sitting at the table hunched over his food half asleep from the booze & she’d say lewt why doncha get yrself on to bed & he’d give her a look & she’d run her thumb across the blade of a russell green river & the nights get so cold the blanket won’t do i can hear the grass talking to the wolf in the corn why is it out there dillinger gives me a tap on the back with the barrel of the thompson while the teller empties her drawer into my flour sack sez didn’t i tell you this one wd be big i love the sound of twenties falling together the first time i showed mama my 45 auto she wiped her hands off on her dress grabbed it outa my hands & ran her fingers up & down the barrel like it was some kind of geography she knew by heart what’s it feel like she asked looking up i cd hear the wind in the corn field where the wolf was & i sd what & she sd don’t play me for that & i sd mama the way i, useto when ever she wanted to know something per sonal & i didn’t want to say killen a man & don’t say you didn’t cuz i know what for you got the look & hell yr my boy it happened so quick yeah i know she sd she went back to cleaning a chicken reaching in where the head used to be & pulling out the heart the liver the guts the blood squeezing out between her fingers dillinger waltzing me outa the way of that bullet somebody screaming i cdn’t pin it down to where it was coming from the night the horse fell on big jim drummond right out in front of our house on little moon road the weight of the horse busted jim all the way thru & when i got there he had his mouth open like he was trying to tell somebody some thing important but he cdn’t re member what his mouth was still going & had all kinds of red smeared on it the horse was making a funny sound at first i thought it was a woman screaming til i saw the big head working mama came outa the house with a sixteen gauge when she walked over the horse a big red stallion rolled back & forth but cdn’t get up by now jim was just watching with his eyes cocked open & his head bent sideways jim can you hear me i think there was a fly on jims face or some kinda bug it was going back & forth like it didn’t know which way to go on the dead skin he’s a goner & she swung the shotgun around on the horse i still remember that hammer going back the click & then the way off thun der & the way lightning climbed into the sky & right in the middle of all that the sound of the six teen gauge going off & the horse jerked around the great head straining again the click & the second barrel going off i cd see her face in the flash the look of it nothing distorted her mouth set the eyes not blinking the way some women blink at loud sounds or bad things happening she was all for staying calm in the looking whiskey breath the night that he came to my room & she caught him i don’t know why but i knew she wd i cdn’t tell her because he sd if i did he’d kill me & he was too big & dark to argue with so i never sd nothing i let him come in i knew he wdn’t stay long but that night he stayed too long the funny thing is i cd hear her breathing she always breathed hard like she’d been working on something & had to take a breath she was like that even when she wasn’t working on a thing she was out there I cd hear her stand on one foot & then the other & i was restless & the old man sd hold still goddamit it ain’t gonna take long & as soon as he sd that she opened the door like i always knew she wd she was wearing a tent dress that was heavy with sweat i cd smell her all the way across the room she smelled of armpits & flour & fried chicken & crotch odor not that she was dirty she was always washing herself but the smell of piss & shit was hard for her to get off & now it was worse because some thing like fury was adding its own special stink the way things happen get mixed in the head i think i’ve got them straight & they get tangled again i remember thinking she’s got a long arm but the knife was buried deep inside the dark & her flesh then the click of something going off bone the old man raised himself off me & sat up in the light off the moon i’d never seen the way he looked before just felt him & it bobbed around in the half dark like it was laughing then i saw mama’s big hand coming around his middle she was pulling him back and back the other hand held the russell green river it looked like she was holding a bat’s wing til she cut thru his windpipe it sounded like a full sink with the water draining out & he leaned back into her & jerked the way he’d been jerking into me & started to shake like a dog just coming out of water & he shook like that hard for awhile til he slumped down she caught him before he got on top of me & shoved him off on the floor i hid under the covers for awhile mama told me to she sd we were going to play a kind of hide & seek game death was out there & he was looking for me but i wd be ok as long as i stayed hid she wdn’t tell him where i was once i asked where did daddy go & she sd not to worry death has got him now & we don’t want him to get you too some how some of his blood got onto my hands & my fingers got all stuck & webbed shut & i told her that & she sd we’ll wash up afterward we’ll wash up good & i cd hear her dragging something down the steps something heavy it went thump thump she was breathing hard now i’ll bet her tent dress was dragging on the stairs dillinger gave me a diamond stick pin for killing that deputy it was big & shiny & i fastened it to my fat red tie & he sd goddam it looks good on you but i never liked killing that deputy because i can feel it when somebody dies their blood stops & i can feel it jerk inside my head & then the ache comes slow at first then softly blinding behind the eyes holding the covers against them didn’t help & i cd smell some thing of daddy on my hands his stink & against my skin i didn’t want that or the way my eyes pulsed mama holding a rose that was all runny in her hand she was downstairs making chopping noises & then i heard her go out the back door dragging something thru the wet night grass dragging daddy down to the hogyard the old shed we didn’t use anymore i cd see her dragging daddy real clear in the moon light & when she stood up to take a breath i cd see daddy didn’t have a head & when i looked over to the edge of the field i thought for a moment i cd see the wolf watching but it wasn’t the whole wolf it was just the head & the front paws but when he looked up & saw me he backed into the field i cd feel him go way back inside & somehow i knew what he was thinking that if he was outside of the corn too long staring at me oh boy & my mama & my daddy without a head that death wd come & get him sure as anything death wd come fetch me down my funeral clothes my black suit with the big rose on it the big rose that never wilts with the thorns all gone fetch it down & while i putting it on let somebody play amazing grace on the piano & some body else come in some place on the violin mama washed me up real good with cold water out of the well she’d bring it in by the bucket full & when i sd it was too cold she sd it takes cold water for the cleansing of human skin cold water child cold water she bathed me right there at the kitchen table where she’d set daddy’s head on some old newspapers he wasn’t bleeding anymore & his eyes were gone so he cdn’t see anything we’ll leave him out a little while she sd it’ll be his way of redeeming himself she wasn’t a church going woman never stepped inside of one she sd but i’m a be loved sister & i know what god wants i saw her naked after she killed him she took off her tent dress & burned it & some of the light off the fire & some of the light off the moon got on her & rolled across the valleys of her fat down her rolling breasts & got lost in her rivers of fat her great gaping navel & slid down her slick watermelon belly into the hair of her crotch & she danced for me danced inside & out of her blood greased with her sweat her dirt & the blood of my daddy dillinger & me at the funeral at first i didn’t want to go up & look at her in the open casket was afraid to dillinger kept poking me in the arm go on go on for chrissake people were looking at us funny especially him he’d nod & smile i was afraid somebody wd turn us in then a tall man in a black coat took us aside looked dillinger in the eye & sd i have a picture of you on my desk in the office but i ain’t agonna turn you in cuz i know the boy here & i don’t want any trouble on a day like this specially from people carrying govermint badges also gimme yr word you won’t rob the bank & be outa this town by tomorrow dillinger gave the sheriff one of his quick crooked smiles & then we went down to take a last look at mama i had my eyes shut til we got to the cas ket when i opened them she looked like she’d shrunk all the skin on her face was hanging off her bones & she was so white i expected her to open her eyes any time but she didn’t the roses she held looked like blood coming out of her when dillinger moved his coat opened on a nickled 45 & somehow that made me feel good i started to turn away & he sd you want a last look i paused & sd no once was enough the mama i remember is from the night she killed him & tasted the butcher knife & offered me some staring up at her dancing staring at the fury of her great navel the rolls of her skin besides i didn’t want to push my luck & see her the way daddy was his head on that table & the flies swarming all over his blood   Todd Moore 9/2/2000