Dakota Civility

148 Dakota Civility Deborah Bogen I come from a long line of talkers who can’t keep the screen door from banging in the breeze, who believe present kindness means future hurt, who huddle over coffeepots as the leathery light gives up to dark, gossiping and fingering the flatware, pretending he’ll be home soon— women who wait for the gravel to signal from the drive. And they can’t blame the boys, their men unfit for parlors, whose tongues loosen only when loon-light quickens the Missouri, when the elms assume their silhouettes and plastic buckets lugged from home hold two or three perch too dumb to know they’re supper. I come from this great truce: hymnals and hunting dogs, bobbin lace and fishing rods. Two sovereignties sharing shoreline, one talking, one silent as gravy. And in the unclaimed territory boys and girls learning Bible verses and curse words, handwork and how to gut a trout, running back and forth carrying messages. ...