His Bible leather’s flop would curve down soft when he bashed random. Reading, he held it out at arm’s length to show memory, and in flood-water tones he set the hook. “If anything, take this away with you,” he would say, under mumble cover. As if he were handing babies up from river-swamped baskets, looking for any arrival of upturned faces. Casting for a chance to undo all that had never worked before. And I could see that he saw it all like a man on a raft. Eyes full of empty ocean.

Daryl Scroggins

has taught creative writing and literature at The University of Texas at Dallas, The University of North Texas, and the Writer’s Garret, in Dallas. He now lives in Marfa, Texas. He is the author of This Is Not the Way We Came In, a collection of flash fiction and a flash novel (Ravenna Press), Winter Investments: Stories (Trilobite Press), and Prairie Shapes: A Flash Novel (winner of the 2004 Robert J. DeMott Prose Contest). His poems, short stories, and creative nonfictions have appeared in magazines and anthologies across the country, including Blink Ink, Cutbank, Eastern Iowa Review, New Flash Fiction Review, Star 82 Review, and Third Wednesday, among others.

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