Blaze

Glacier, Calving

55 GLACIER, CALVING Kachemak Bay, Alaska We picked through shoulder high wide blade grasses, listening to the fading snicker and he-yup of the trainer posting a skittish foal. The massive hooves of unshod Morgans turned the soil, carved hollows to catch timothy seed, grave half-moons to cradle rain. A sweet-water stream emptied across rock beach into Kachemak Bay. Across the way, glaciers thrust splintered shale into black-shined moraine, quick rivers charging inside them. The bay caught the light, threw it back. Something inside you let go. You spoke of your father, who never learned to read, grinding his teeth as you helped his hand scrawl the letters of his painful name. You told of the grandmother who wished you never born, for fear you’d be like him. I held you. That bitter river coursed. At sunset we hiked to the rough lumber cabin. Mud daubers under the eaves dove for our faces, then banked and soared over the unfenced field. All night mosquitoes drilled through sleep— each slap of little death awake, and wet, and echoing. ...