FIRST ENCOUNTER WITH PAUAHTUN

A commotion at the lake
in the center of our cul-de-sac,
muddy pupil encircled
by shoddy duplexes:
someone calls over Pleasant,
our village elder: maybe eighty,
always outfitted in cowboy boots,
black jeans, a denim shirt
that looked as old as him,
and a straw hat atop his bald head,
his little Toyota pickup truck
that matched his shirt
always parked next door.
My mom brought me to see:
a massive turtle entangled
in a fist of fishing line.
Pleasant haunched over the creature
in the ankle deep water of the shore
without a worry for his prized boots.
In silence, he apparated a knife
slowly and skillfully
cut away at the line
as though he’d done this
a thousand times before.
The image is blurry:
light reflecting
on the wavering waters
behind him,
light reflecting off the blade
as though the brightness itself
was capable of cutting
the animal free.
The small crowd
of children and parents
stunned at the size of the creature,
stunned at Pleasant’s familiarity,
almost as if they two
were being reunited.
The turtles patient
obsidian eyes scrying
through me with a strange knowing.
When the last of the fishing line fell
from the shell,
the knife vanished,
and Pleasant knelt to grab
the turtle, wide as a car tire,
lifted it up and over his head
for everyone to see.
From my childish vantage
I saw a celestial object
rising in the air,
eclipsing the sun.