| OCR Text |
Show Deer Hunt 2 leaves, planted strong and homely like the early people here. Close by the creek the fertile strip of willow bushes, chokecherries with clusters of blossoms hanging,usually brown and withered by the late and killing frost, but not this year of years-hawthorne stiff and tangled, white and pink in blossom so graciously harboring sharp, inch-long thorns. With sharp nostalgia we crouched through undergrowth into the opening around the weir. My feet yearned for the bare touch of the cool mud slopes around that calm expanse of water, calm before it tumbled rumbled furiously over the dam. Fifty feet across it backed up Beaver Creek as if to give a final moment's pause before it broke in two, becoming Beaver Creek and Thorn Creek each rushing into either side of town. I thought of stripping off my clothes-and Harry even yelled, "Let's go in!" And with his fingers undid his belt and pants. And he was only joking! we knew that, for even in the dead of summer's heat that water's cold would grab you with a tell. But soon the flesh, pliable flesh, would melt to oneness in the cool and languid flow. Thinking then of leaping in, I felt my groin grow taut, but then I thought of all the leaping, splashing, naked boys and wondered which held most allure, the thrill of nakedness, a minor act defying people parents clothed and prim, or thrill of the cool of the water of the weir of the creek. After the weir we leapt and ran through two forgotten fields, fallow now; but once, I guess, some hardy's farmer's plow strove through dark, thick earth, turning shining furrows round and round behind a plodding horse. The field now lay in weeds, stung alfalfa scrubby new, and wild shocks of grass of timothy. We raced for several yards, dodging deadly gopher holes waiting silently to trip us up, until we reached the fence, the fence of wire barbed more, I think, to keep the people out than dumb beasts in, and with what joy I grabbed the fence, defying barbs and ugliness and rolled my body through |
