Let\u2019s just say the Book was correct, and it all started with a single breath. Inspiration\u2014>Expiration. All the seconds in between these two. A breath into the void. A breath before saying \u201cI love you.\u201d A single breath to inflate the giant balloon of my ambition. The force of those breaths pulling so much else, so many people, with them into whatever gape I chose to fill. How many others\u2019 breaths pulled in tow? How many sucked into my own trajectory? Seeing it all this way, I can\u2019t help but think of Linda standing patiently, proudly next to me, totally balanced on her own two feet until that moment when I opened my mouth to set all of this into motion. And frozen in that one memory is the inevitable flow of air into space, the carnage I\u2019ve lived since.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
________<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Jack B. Bedell is Professor of English and Coordinator of Creative Writing at Southeastern Louisiana University where he also edits <\/em>Louisiana Literature and directs the Louisiana Literature Press. Jack\u2019s work has appeared in <\/em>HAD, <\/em>Heavy Feather, <\/em>Pidgeonholes, <\/em>The Shore, <\/em>Moist, <\/em>Okay Donkey, <\/em>EcoTheo, <\/em>The Hopper, <\/em>Terrain, and other journals. His latest collection is <\/em>Against the Woods\u2019 Dark Trunks (Mercer University Press, 2022). He served as Louisiana Poet Laureate 2017-2019.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"