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The Dove in the Belly

Jim Grimsley
Contents (46)
  1. CONTENTS
  2. Homeless
  3. The Boardinghouse
  4. Ehringhaus
  5. Boxes
  6. After Dark
  7. Heart Line
  8. AUGUST
  9. SEPTEMBER
  10. OCTOBER
  11. NOVEMBER
  12. DECEMBER
  13. JANUARY
  14. FEBRUARY
  15. MARCH AND APRIL
  16. First Night
  17. Odd Job
  18. Ambiguous
  19. African Violet
  20. I, Claudius
  21. That Obscure Object
  22. Brainhead
  23. Architecture
  24. Long Distance
  25. Best of Times
  26. Turtletrack
  27. Hospital Bed
  28. Wife and Husband
  29. Nina
  30. An Elegy
  31. Fall
  32. JULY
  33. AUGUST
  34. SEPTEMBER
  35. OCTOBER
  36. Some Meetings
  37. Then in Rain
  38. Beat Duke
  39. He’s Not Here
  40. The Brooch
  41. Mrs. Delacy
  42. Minette
  43. One Sunset
  44. AUTHOR’S NOTE
  45. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  46. SOME NOTES ON THIS BOOK’S PRODUCTION
Cover: The Dove in the Belly by Jim Grimsley
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Also by Jim Grimsley

Novels:

Forgiveness

Winter Birds

Comfort and Joy

Dream Boy

My Drowning

Kirith Kirin

Boulevard

The Ordinary

The Last Green Tree

Memoir:

How I Shed My Skin

Short Stories:

Jesus Is Sending You This Message

Plays:

Mr. Universe and Other Plays

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This is an Arthur A. Levine book

Published by Levine Querido

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www.levinequerido.com • [email protected]

Levine Querido is distributed by Chronicle Books, LLC

Text copyright © 2022 by Jim Grimsley

All rights reserved

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data is available

Hardcover ISBN: 978-1-64614-131-9

Ebook ISBN: 978-1-64614-149-4

Published May 2022

For Lynna Williams

CONTENTS

  1. Homeless
  2. The Boardinghouse
  3. Ehringhaus
  4. Boxes
  5. After Dark
  6. Heart Line
  7. First Night
  8. Odd Job
  9. Ambiguous
  10. African Violet
  11. I, Claudius
  12. That Obscure Object
  13. Brainhead
  14. Architecture
  15. Long Distance
  16. Best of Times
  17. Turtletrack
  18. Hospital Bed
  19. Wife and Husband
  20. Nina
  21. An Elegy
  22. Fall
  23. Some Meetings
  24. Then in Rain
  25. Beat Duke
  26. He’s Not Here
  27. The Brooch
  28. Mrs. Delacy
  29. Minette
  30. One Sunset
  31. Author’s Note
  32. Acknowledgments

The whole of appearance is a toy. For this,
The dove in the belly builds his nest and coos …

—Wallace Stevens

Homeless

OUT OF THE BLUE SHE CALLED. He had learned to dread news from his mother. There was always a crisis, a change, a sorrow, a complaint, a plea. The sound of her voice could bring an ache to his insides. He held the phone and watched the frame of the window, light and moody clouds, a few people hanging out on the long balconies of each floor of the dorm. They were watching the baseball game, the white-uniformed players on the green turf of the stadium just beyond the parking lot. He heard the snap of a bat as if it were next to his ear, a collective sound of consternation from the stands at commotion in the outfield. Caught. Out. He took a deep breath.

His mother’s voice had that edge of brightness that he knew to be brittle and feigned. She was as happy as a woman could be, she said. He could picture her sitting on the edge of the colonial rocking chair that she had bought from Furniture Fair in Goldsboro, where she lived now. The cushions were covered in a beige cloth printed with butter churns, milking stools, and washtubs. The chair made a creaking sound, its springs expanding and contracting as she moved restlessly back and forth; he could hear it, a sort of undertone to her words. She told him, in a rush, she was moving to Nevada next week and marrying a new husband.

“Oh, lord, it was like a miracle. I met him at the One Stop, you know, when I was working at the cash register—he was buying a pack of Pall Malls, my favorite cigarette. And I tell you what, a thrill ran through me like a bolt from heaven, it had to be a sign of true love. A person knows what true love feels like.” The wedding would be at a casino in Las Vegas in one of those fast-turnaround chapels, Ronny didn’t need to worry about being there.