The Knocking

She wrapped a sandwich in paper towel and passed it to me where I waited at the door as she’d required. Wait here, she said. Said it through the screen, narrowing her gaze, sizing my purpose, leaving the latch bolted.

I stood and studied the starlings swooping in and out of the hayloft. Listened to the cattle calling and answering in the pasture behind the barn.

Pet the dog, a gray-shag mutt who cowered and flinched if I clenched a fist.

She’d buttered the bread, sliced it thick and crusty. Ham and pickle. I walked back to the roadside and sat in the thistles, feasting. Had to hold on, both hands, bite and tear at it like a badger, like a wolverine. Didn’t entirely savor looking dangerous, didn’t mind it either. When is anything just this, just that?

Here’s milk, she called out. She’d set a jar on a tree stump halfway between us. Fine hairs on my neck divined she was close by. Before I could turn, she was headed home to her pots and pans and knives, the gray dog trotting beside her, glancing back.

Lowell Jaeger

Lowell Jaeger's most recent collection is entitled Earth-blood & Star-shine. Recently Jaeger was awarded the Montana Governor’s Humanities Award for his work in promoting thoughtful civic discourse.