Peter Sears: "Night Fishing"

The water is a glaze like loneliness at ease

with itself I cast and close my eyes for the whir

out across the water, the line striking the surface

and sinking. I like waiting for it to settle on the bottom,

then jig it up a little. I imagine the lure in utter dark.

I play it lightly. Fish rise. Just shy of the surface,

they play their glints off the moon on the water.

I see too my own loneliness. It's not too big

and it breathes easily. Soon, it may pretend it's rain.

Rain blurs the water. There is nothing wrong.

with rain. I take a deep breath and cast and cast.

"Night Fishing" by Peter Sears, from Small Talk: New & Selected Poems (Lynx House Press, 2014). Text as posted on The Writer's Almanac (09/10/14).

Art credit: Untitled image of night fishing by unknown photographer.