Mud
By CL Bledsoe

It’ll suck you in if you slow

down. Each step, a throaty

release of rubber coming free

of deep mud. A line of men pulling

a net across the darkness

to gather catfish, buffalo fish,

dumpgulls circling overhead.

All of them working on

hangovers from the night before.

This is how bodies are broken,

not with a crack but a slow push.

I was afraid if I stepped in,

I’d never get free.
['Not Another Tv Dad']
['Poetry']