Talisman
Jamie-on-Parole stood the teak
figurine bought in Sudan
with his last hundred bucks
on the get-to-know-you
talisman table. After his house—
well, his grandmother’s house—
burned down, he joined
the merchant marine. “I’m sorry,”
said Josh, “but that’s bullshit.”
Tamika said, “Yeah.” Jordan said,
“Where’s Sudan?” Jamie jumped ship
in Marseille, tramped around Egypt
& ended up in Sudan, the best
people he’d ever met. Maddy’s
“Bob” Clemente baseball, the binky
Jasmine chewed till second grade,
Josh’s grandfather’s pipe wrench
& now a teak warrior, oblong shield
from neck to knee. A hundred bucks
would feed a whole Sudanese
province, no? Maybe that’s an old
National Geographic talking. “Facts are
slippery things,” quoth the cliché.
Facts are fire ants or maybe termites
& that’s a fact. Right now, Mobile,
Alabama is home, but you can pine
for hot red dust anywhere. Jillie said,
“Who’d you mug?” “I named him
“Starting-Over Guy,” Jamie said.
*
John Repp is a poet and fiction writer living in Erie, Pennsylvania. Seven Kitchens Press will soon publish his twelfth chapbook of poetry, Star Shine in the Pines.
