Gina Williams

BELONGING

Fireflies pulse against twilight,
clouding in the hickory trees
on a thick Indiana summer night.

Dank air rises from creek bottoms,
all muddy toes, crayfish pinch, catfish holes. 
Malarial. Dangerous.

Grandpa sits granite-faced, silent
on the porch–trading 
sweet tea for hooch
when Grandma isn’t looking,
streaks of coal dust
missed at the water pump

vein down the poplar trunk
of his neck, sweat crawling
across his forehead like cave crickets.

Men around here rise from the mines 
each dusk, dark-faced and hard, return home

empty-pailed, wordless. 

Kids play tag in the yard,
scatter fireflies with mason jars.
Grandma wrings chickens for supper with bare hands,
shouts warnings– 

watch out for thorns, sinkholes, snapping turtles–
belts and switches if you keep it up.
A thieving moon rises above the fields.

A dinner bell sounds,
prayers offered,
good god, good grace.

Grandpa’s hands are big as racoons.
Someday he’ll teach me 
how to tie my shoes. 

There’s a soft place across his brow,
but I know about a secret passage through the corn
leading to a hill where crosses burned.

White hood
in Grandpa’s closet
starched heavier than his Sunday suit.

Gina Williams is a freelance journalist, gardener, former wildland firefighter, and visual artist. The author of An Unwavering Horizon, a full-length collection of poetry published in 2020 (Finishing Line Press), her writing and visual art have been featured most recently by Moss, River Teeth, FRAMES Magazine, J. Mane Gallery, Electric Lit, Carve, and The Sun, among others. She holds degrees in journalism and strategic communication from the University of Oregon. Gina lives and creates near Portland, Oregon with her best friend and fellow poet, husband Brad Garber.

Learn more about Gina and her work at https://ginamariewilliams.com/