Current
Issue
Volume 12.2
Keith Woodruff
—
Live Bait
For sun fish, black and yellow tent worms
I broomed down
from heart-shaped catalpa leaves.
For bass, nightcrawlers plucked
from grass after rain and leopard frogs
drumming against a coffee can lid.
My alphabet of bait. I forget
the lakes and ponds. Remember only
the frog now. Piercing a hook up
through the white petal of its throat,
and out the beak-nose with a quick
stitching motion. Croaks rising
to high-pitched chirps, small toes
pushing against my grip. I only caught
that sound: the sharp pop, hook
breaking skin, air whistling out.
How many times can one frog die?
O, tiny gold-eyed hell, I see you.
Keith Woodruff lives in San Antonio, TX with a backyard full of moody tomato plants. His poetry has appeared in Tupelo Quarterly, Sundog Lit, New World Writing Quarterly and RAWHEAD. His flash and micro writing in lovely places like Wigleaf, Bending Genres, Does it Have Pockets? JMWW, HAD and is forthcoming in Pithead Chapel and Heavy Feather Review. Read him in Best Small Fictions 2017, 2019 and at keithawoodruff.com. He was awarded a 2018 Pushcart Prize. @keithwoodruff.bsky.social
