Incident at Jacobs Creek

                        1976

Dawn Potter

Behind the vending-machine house,

down by the crick, is a dug-out lake,

nasty green and dark. “Keep Away!!”

says the sign and the lake’s roped off,

I don’t know why. Our ma swam there

when she was a kid but not us, we’re stuck

with this bleach-stink pool and big wet

boys in their cutoffs are always flicking 

Salem butts into the shallow baby end.

When by mistake I breathe in that blue

water, my nose smells like dirty socks.

I hate that. Me and my sister take turns

running into the vending-machine house

to buy melty ice creams and so we can stuff

more dimes in the jukebox. We earned them

from seven-card stud with our grandpap.

On the jukebox we like to play songs we hate

which is songs like “Afternoon Delight”

and “Silly Love Songs” and “That’s the Way

Uh-Huh Uh-Huh I Like It I Like It.”

These are the stupidest songs ever sung

on the radio but they are funny

and we laugh like monkeys

to show we’re having a great time,

then we call each other retarded.

My sister is younger than me but taller.

People think we are twins.

I hate that but she hates it worse

because she is more beautiful

our granny says. But her bathing suit

is uglier in my opinion. Mine

is almost just as ugly though.

In that nasty lake down by the crick

some ducks are paddling around.

Maybe somebody died in it a while ago

so they won’t let kids swim there

because they never found the body.

My idea is they should write a mystery

about this place but probably in real life

the true facts are way too boring to care.

[first published in The Fourth River (2012)]