Someone Mentions Wild Geese Were Kept in Greek Households to Warn the Family of Fire or Intruders When Father Was Off at War

By Christopher Smith

photo by Ekaterina Astakhova on Pexels 

Wade far enough into the valley, the sun marks banker’s hours.
I sit some shade of darkness two-thirds of every day.

The figure I relate to in the Phaethon myth: that downy little greenhorn
presses Phaethon to prove he’s the chariot’s child.

Who can buy even their own fables about their father?
Portraits of him waving down a sunbeam. Personal olios

of corporate fishing retreats, wood block watchtowers, the empty chair
at back of the theatre. Have I ever been that friend, that sick of the frozen,

fearful of the lampless, parched for a mid-afternoon goose chase?
Ever been party to the taunting of the village’s loneliest child?

I’ve challenged quacks to fatal games of chicken, counter-bluffed so often
I forgot who fathered the deceit. I’ve bullied the illegitimate, been bullied,

the illegitimate, been legitimately frightened my father was Helios
metamorphosized as a bull. Prayed I wouldn’t wake up

choking on the ashes of my own tongue. Remember, paddle backwards,
but keep it even or you’ll corkscrew. Paddle forwards, but only

when you can’t use your wings. The family garden is never substantial,
never bell and bulb enough to keep you from calling the poolhalls, 

listening for voices that sound like your own. One day my little brother
spilled the whole loaf into the fishpond. One day he caught the sun.

One day I practiced blind casting, hooked the concrete tongue of a frenzied duck.
One day we dove in after our father and never came back up.

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