4/30 THE POET GOES FISHININ

fishinin for slippery

sentences with struggling

verbs catch words
and phrases

lines and hooks

sometimes a simile

like a stork

on one leg in the mud

trawls the shallow waters

scooping wiggling

vowels in the bill

sometimes like an osprey

swooping from above

dives into salt and spray

or from the surface of the sea

a surfing cormorant

snorkels with beak-spear

stalks and dives and preys

on pelagic consonants

or even a frigging

pirate frigate afraid

to touch the water

would rather plagiarize

fishes from a gull

the fisherman will dig

in fertile soil to find

wriggling fat earthworms

with wry net wade for sherigo

herring shrimp fry-dry

or sardonic sardine bait

his box of tackle packed

with lines and hooks and hook-

lines a Webster dicthesaurus

and a string of alphabets

sits patient as the rock

on which he sits

waiting for a bite

sometimes a galoshed angler

standing in the shallows

casting reel and rod

hooks a writhing metaphor

gaffs it in the gills

and lifts it clear of water

once in a while a line gets snagged

between the reefs and rocks

sometimes a tarpon takes the hook

leaps clear of murky water

for one moment's air-

show spectacle

then plunges down again

under water out of sight

to struggle taut with pain

or a tuna torpedo

from inscrutable deep blue

will surface into sunlight

blindly snatch at plastic lure

snap a worn out nylon-cliché line

and plummet down once more

and then there is the prize catch

fresh with shining scales

to be proudly weighed upon the scale

patience is rewarded

he will not return

empty handed

the poet has gone to fishin

somewhere in Trinbago

and with a participle

is fishinin for words

©2013 by G Newton V Chance