My Father Taught Me To Fish Poem by Poetry Poetry

Why did we have to kill you.
No that's not it.
How come I didn't care or was even excited, exhilarated
by your death.
When we pulled you from the sea and onto the boat,
your eyes round with surprise
like a man's when he's falling from his chair,
you must have known
you'd had it. Something inside the free and wild
always knows but who knows
how a cod's heart works.
If it works like mine
then I think I must have heard it — or at least
something wet, I remember this,
drummed itself to death on the deck of our little boat.