Hemingway’s Shotgun

you need to

make your

protagonist

more likable

someone said

of my latest

attempt at

novel writing

immortality.

 

because if

you don’t,

no one will

want to finish

the book even

though it’s

brilliant in

parts, and

 

I said,

thanks for

reading

and told

him he was

a stupid

fuck albeit

under my

breath and

 

I thought about his advice.

 

I thought about

 

bookstores and libraries,

rows and rows of

boring books

I’ve made

myself read

over the years

so I could

see how it was

done, and most

of those books

are written by

professors of English

or creative writing,

 

I thought about

all of their likable

protagonists, upper

mostly, full of

conflict and suburban

angst, so unlike

my most recent

protagonist,

vain, selfish, lazy

and conflicted 

 

and that’s the

character I’m

rolling with

maybe because I’m

 

vain, selfish, lazy

and conflicted

with absolutely

no hope for

 

resolution.

(David LaBounty lives in suburban Detroit with his wife and two sons. His poetry has been published in several online and print journals. His most recent novel is The Trinity)