| Icetrap (previously published in the Nebraska Review) Inside the heavy tents on Lake Winnebago, beside cars parked on the frozen water, the sons of Appleton sleep to the pulpy smell from paper mills while their fathers, who've talked about everything there is to talk about, talk about the Packers' first round draft options. Back in Appleton, the roar of the Fox River can't convince anyone of a way out. If you listen you can hear Bob Buchannan's famous declaration: I've seen the future, and it's paper. Some waters are frozen and some are not. The Harry Houdini Museum is a big place and hard to get out of. Young girls dream of Harry finding them in a lonely corridor. Harry begs them to follow him, and they do, to a place of no winters, where no one's father makes paper. Where no one's father is unable to find his way after too many absinthes at The Harry Houdini Lounge. Where no cars sleep on ice. Where sons don't icefish, daughters aren't stuck home waiting. Like fish paved over by winter. Sitting In the Sun On summer Sundays at Nomahegan Swim Club people know us. People know us, and when they pass our cabana they begin to say hello. They begin to say hello because we've belonged for nineteen years. I'm not sure why. No one's allowed on the high dive because someone's daughter fell off and needed reconstructive facial surgery. We sit in the sun a lot. Maybe if we sit out here long enough, we won't look like ourselves anymore. Aphelion Done fade toward sun ( ( ( Dirt is warm Rains come Aphids drink (the sauce of plants My lover learns (how sun becomes as possible as creeping snowberries What will splash (in winter thaw We will splash (in hush of white on white |