Slugs slick with rainwater cling to my dog’s hair,
black lumps of tiny matter, baby slugs
like snot, like something freaky you’d shake out
after a tear through tall grass, and yet, here one
was, nestled in the valley between two fingers
after a good session of dog love, pats and rubs,
a yuck of wet life. At my desk, I had no time
to repatriate the tiny traveler, letting it linger
on a notepad while I graded a paper, wrote a poem,
paid bills, bought a blouse for my mother (will ship
today!). Then I jumped up to do errands, feed the dogs,
live like I need to live, do what I need to do, forgetting
until I sat down just now to look to my left, at the pad,
noting only a squiggle of something, a small dark
hardness, a shell, a squib, a tendril, all that was left
of the plump slug, a onceness of creature, a remnant,
a peel, a bit of nothing that I will flick to the floor
and vacuum up, leaving no juice, nothing left behind.
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 26, Issue 2.
Jessica Barksdale Inclán is the author of 15 novels, including the award-winning The Burning Hour as well as Her Daughter’s Eyes, The Matter of Grace, and When You Believe. Her debut poetry collection, When We Almost Drowned, was published in March 2019. A Pushcart Prize, Million Writers Award, and Best-of-the-Net nominee. Barksdale Inclán was an English professor at Diablo Valley College in Pleasant Hill, California, for 31 years, and continues to teach novel writing for UCLA Extension and the MFA program for Southern New Hampshire University.
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