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Bio: Orval Lund is a recently retired English professor who recommends the experience (retirement or professing English) to anyone. His Casting Lines: Poems was a winner of the Minnesota Voices Competition. In addition, he has published two chapbooks and many individual poems in many different journals and anthologies, as well as having read his poetry from Japan to Alaska to Vermont, but mostly in his home state of Minnesota. He now bides his time reading, writing, fishing, and blogging at orvstuff.messagemonster.com.
Swimming Lessons
the crawl everywhere, to perfect
an overhand stroke, an early attempt at beauty.
After all, my usual dog-paddle
looked like a dog in water, not
the lithe, streaming flow of dog at full romp.
I was of an age when I could do this
without seeming odd to the others.
If I swam down the stairs and into the kitchen,
so what? I was just a kid, barely
fledged.
And who cared if someone saw me swimming
down the street, or down the railroad tracks?
Despite this dry-land practice, I never
learned to look good in water swimming
an overhand stroke, though I wonder how
I know. Somehow, I just know, y'know?
A matter of self-confidence, perhaps--
or its lack--knowing you're not beautiful.
Now I, once a slim minnow, have
dog-paddled
to the shallows and crawled up onto a dock
where I must suck in my gut. It's
tiring.
But there's still a sleek and hopeful swimmer
inside. One day, I think, he'll get
out
and swim off, flailing his arms like a bird.