just before dawn, except for one furrow
where my boat plows through,
dragging a silver spinner across the water.
When the fish strikes, I’ll pull it like a root
from the dark, its white belly cold and soft,
its eyes shocked wide at the light
that lures it from that deep pocket of sleep.
It’s the harvest of cold-blooded souls
where a loosed line sets me reeling,
where an appetite still tugs from a place
I can sense with the crook of my finger.