Times Like These: Marianna, Florida

One woe is past; and, behold, there come two woes more hereafter.

—Revelation 9:12

In one field, corn husks, muscadine vines & a sugar cane graveyard furrow acres aching for the devil to beat his wife. In another, a skein of maggots & a horde of mayflies, their musk thick & resolute, jockey for the cow's afterbirth. Down Old U.S. Road apiece, wheezing weevils & chafing bales of hay settle for the wind's sneezes. Wait for a sign, the couple says. They set their table with linens, damask & fresh-pressed for a feast of canned sardines & cornbread, train up their child in the way he should babble. From dusk till dusk, they lull him to sleep with tales of a faraway sea, barrels of oysters to shuck. OurFatherwhichart inheavenhallowedbethynamethykingdomcomethywillbedoneonearthasitis inheaven. Still no rain: their Tower of Babel futile. From dusk till dusk, they till dust. They can't resist any longer. They reach for the cards, locks of hair & black-eyed peas, stowed away for times like these.