Un-Country

“Isn’t it fun to gallop in a princess dress,”

I say, calves

deep in the sludge

we call ‘The River’ in the woods

near the bay. Some would’ve waited

to hear Momma yell

like a Saturday cartoon through the suburb,

but I knew Daddy’s whistle as it waded

over the neighborhood,

between my ruddy knees,

like the hand of God

chiding at a sinner in church: “Ain’t

you oughta put some pants on,”

it shrilled.

My reply came twenty years later: a leak

in my holy Christmas boots and a tear

in my daughter’s hand-me-down dress.

We slosh

all the way home.