Writing a River

Mudfoot put down his Stella guitar, which had cost $27.38 at the local pawn shop. He got up from his rocking chair on the front porch of his shotgun house in New Orleans’ Irish Channel and started walking slowly to the Mississippi River three blocks away. His disciples, twelve children who hung on his every word after school, followed him, jostling for position to see who could stay closest to the master.

Climbing the levee, Mudfoot looked at a Liberian freighter as it was piloted to the mouth of the river by a tug.

“I’ve just written a river,” he told his followers. “A writer summons the world—its people, places, and objects—into existence by the act of looking. The words follow when the right time comes, but first you’ve got to look.”

“Then everyone’s a writer,” cried Peter, a black child shaved bald.

“No, no, no,” answered Mudfoot. “Most people are blind. They look but don’t see. A writer—that’s a different story. He chooses to cure his blindness. He opens his eyes because the Spirit lays heavy upon his mind. When he sees, he then begins to create the world. He gets out his legal pad and pencil, he sits at his typewriter.”

The currents of the Mississippi swirled together, browns and blues twining together like ribbons in a breeze.

“It’s a good river,” he said.

“What comes next?” Peter asked.

“Chapter two. Another ship will come, and there will be people on it from different lands. They will travel far into the ocean and night, where the plot thickens and the reader knows that something special is going on. Now come along home, children. I’ve started a book. It’s time for Mudfoot to rest.”