and a blue, floating clockwise
around the tower.
My aunt had phoned in the middle of the night
to urge us into the yard for a look.
This was the summer of UFO reports, but if they spooked my old man,
he didn’t show it.
At eight or nine I was already in a panic —
everything seemed a sign.
Oddly, though, no one ever mentioned that night again,
and how reliable, really, is the memory?
Now when I try to force my mind back, it runs straight
to the bulbs on a tree, those Christmas lights
glazing our dining-room windows.
The Grocer’s Tackle Box
Not all dreams need to be realized.
PATTI SMITH
My obsession with gear
comes from a grandpa who rarely caught a fish
but kept in his tackle box one of every lure
he ever sold in his store.
I was especially drawn to the potbellied Bombers,
deep runners meant for pike and walleye,
but also the rainbow Rattlebugs, the pink doll flies trailing
yellow boas
loved by crappie and bass,
and the speckled plastic worms,
rubber frogs and tadpoles, the fat, tangerine Hula Poppers.
He kept his tackle box behind his cash register, tucked
behind cartons of bills and tax receipts.
As a boy I could walk by the Coke box and feel its draw.
Someday, he kept saying, he’d take me fishing
but never did. That was okay.
To prove the promise sometimes outweighs the fish,
he’d often let me open that box and thumb
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