SWAMP THING RUMINATES ON A LINE FROM THOMAS MERTON — JACK B. BEDELL

Your life is shaped by the end you live for. You are made in the image of what you desire. The first time I heard this, I was holed up in the palmettos behind Our Lady of Blind River waiting for the sun to drop so I could move on. There was a woman inside the chapel chanting Merton, and it all seemed to square with the world to the left and right of me. Because I was sitting in the shade hungry, it sounded like standard nutritional advice, actually. Clean fuel in, clean energy out, you know. You are what you eat kind of stuff. I mean, the poule d’eau diving for fish in the water behind me tasted like fish, the choupique nosing silt tasted like mud, so it made sense then. Looking at my own reflection on the bayou now, though, I’m starting to realize Merton was herding us more toward the Zen of desire with all that stuff. My whole grown life, I’ve been alone in a lab chasing God, trying to make something out of nothing like He did. I never wanted to BE God. That was never my goal. I wanted to be as God is to this world, a provider, someone who could turn stone into bread or desert into paradise so we could all share in it. And look at me now. There is nothing in this whole swamp more consubstantial than I am—all dirt and vine and anger and guilt. Infinitely so, in the image of my desire.

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Jack B. Bedell is Professor of English and Coordinator of Creative Writing at Southeastern Louisiana University where he also edits Louisiana Literature and directs the Louisiana Literature Press. Jack’s work has appeared in Barren, Pidgeonholes, The Shore, Okay Donkey, EcoTheo, The Hopper, HAD, and other journals. His latest collection is Color All Maps New (Mercer University Press, 2021). He served as Louisiana Poet Laureate 2017-2019.