After the Flood

Abstract

After the Flood Mark Smith-Soto (bio) "It's a miracle the creature survived…" -CNN Dear Sir, who didn't think it polite to listento Díos míos exploding from ten thousand throatsor to pious WTF's shouted into the wallof water buckling on oldsters and tots—let usstop right here to thank you, Father-Who'd-Rather-Not, Parent Inapparent, dead-beat Daddyjust whistling Dixie forever! Let us thank youfor the skinny ass of this dog making the news,thank you for the rotten water he lapped fromhis high ledge in the kitchen, for the bites of drownedtrash that floated through the busted window intohis starving jaw—thank you, thank you, Sir, for thisone life you weren't there to turn your face from,this stray miracle committed in your absence. [End Page 76] Mark Smith-Soto Mark Smith-Soto's books include Our Lives Are Rivers (University Press of Florida, 2003), Any Second Now (Main Street Rag Publishing Co., 2006), and Time Pieces (Main Street Rag Publishing Co., 2015). Fever Season: Selected Poetry of Ana Istarú (2010) and Berkeley Prelude: A Lyrical Memoir (2013) were published by Unicorn Press. Awarded a 2006 NEA Fellowship in Creative Writing, he's had work in Kenyon Review, Nimrod, Rattle, The Sun, etc. Copyright © 2020 University of Wisconsin Board of Regents