This Spot Poem by Francis Santaquilani

This spot's only good for fishing.

No one taught me how.

The sun in the water hurts me

More than the sun in the sky.

A motorboat's buzz threatens

Like a swarm of bees.

Can't look up or down. Turn away!

A gauntlet of proud fathers and giddy sons

Unfurls. My feet are frozen.

My wounds stretch, tear and flare.

Turn the other way!

The corner under the pier, yes,

Greenish, wooden pilars, massive stones

Shadows, the dying wake.

A fish head,

Frantic, signals me.

Ridiculous in a lei of green muck and trash.

It slaps its hollow head against two slick,

Gray stones, loosening its lei.

Flies storm out of its black eye

Sockets and terrible, silent, black mouth.

Never looking back.

Even its stink has abondened it.

The last of the shine

Slides from its silver scales,

Swirls into the green muck,

Catches a little sun and sinks.

Both of our screams are silent.