Luke Johnson

To My Son Who Asks about Baptism

If you wake
and want to wash your feet

in a river,
reach above the baskets

in the bare garage
and pull from darkness

a folded flannel
to drape across your arms.

Follow where the stones
were pressed

and place your hand
on wire fence

to feel if rain is close.
Come to where

the road stops suddenly
and squint. Scan the space

between two poplars,
where swallows weave

to gouge persimmons
and a river carves

the canyon’s sand
drags behind

drowned lures
mummified trees

lamb skulls hacked
and smooth. Listen: If you

want to wash your feet
in a river—don’t. Rise before

the freight train
shakes the floor

and walk the fields
with blossoming hunger

to gather up wild berries.
Fill a bucket

with bleach and salt
and scrub the skins

to cut the tannins    cracking
them with your teeth.

Spit the husks
and scatter the seeds.

Suck until the juice
runs down your chin.

Son, lay in the laps of lavender
and admire the grasses

that shadow
and sway, sweetly,

when the rain erupts—

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Luke Johnson lives on the California Coast with wife and three kids. His poems can be found at The Kenyon Review, Florida Review, Narrative Magazine, Thrush, Valparaiso Review, Nimrod, Tinderbox and elsewhere. He was a finalist for the Pablo Neruda Prize, and his chapbook, :boys, was published by Blue Horse Press in 2019.