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Show Blue Run/50 mixed "Under these red cliffs " Til be" Joey held the boat paddle in the slack water, sculling, watching us out of the corner of his eye The woodpeckers hammered a cypress O.W.'d agreed to adopt Joey, to give my boy his name. What would he say to Daddy? "He'd lied about a job. Every morning he got up and dressed like he was a ground electrician Then he went somewhere and stayed all day. I don't know where. His brother Davey, the dwarf, he told me Buddy had a second wife. And they had a baby. He knew I was leaving, taking Joey." "Your daddy doesn't know that. How'd you get out?" Off in the distance I could hear the men sloshing, my husband and my father, my son catching light in the bow, saying words now into water, his lips forming little syllables and vowels. "He kept saying he loved me." Joey's eyes were on mine-his own voice barely making sounds. "Davey was with us. We all just climbed out and didn't say anything He knew I was taking Joey away from there. He took me out there to kill me. But he backed down He kept talking about love." "Did you love him still?" "Yep " "How?" 1 Daddy was in front, three green heads strung off his belt, wingtips just skiffing the water O.W. behind, a pair of green heads, walking the way a man walks after he's killed "He'll do," Daddy said. "You look chilly-willy, Joey. Looky here." Daddy handed Joey his gun, said be |