Don't Do Like Purvis
J.T. Ledbetter
When you see eyes like that, he said,
you had better run the other way.
But there's only one way, I said,
and he nodded and said I was one
sorry S.O.B. and drank his pepsi
and put a giant meal worm on his hook
and said this lake is surely tough
and not like the southern lakes where
he fished while watching the kudzu
take his grandfather's barn and his
mama and papa scoured the hard red
dirt to make it. And don't look at
them eyes if it hurts you to do it,
he says, while giving a tug on his line.
Let it go, he says, and just fish or
else you will go bats the way Purvis
Redmon did when he saw that girl
in the Mall where she sold ice cream
on some kind of stick and was never
the same carefree boy again; so if
you can't look into them eyes, don't.
Fish instead. Bait your hook. Use some
of them mongo worms you bought
instead of, or rather, along with them
peanut clusters you like. They won't
give you the heartburn, nor will you
be likely to go silly as you might
if you continue to look into them
eyes. You don't want to do like Purvis.
It was not a pretty sight. So let's
fish. As it says in Hezakiah 3:12,
fish em if you got em and keep your
eyes tight on your line. It's words
I've lived by all these years, so there's
my advice, take it or leave it; and
forget them eyes because they may
not be looking your way no way, so
just look at them shadows rising
off the bottom heading straight for
daddy worm, and feel righteous all over.
Might work.
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