Wild Trout Poem by Nancy Cherry

The wild trout in my freezer
keep their eyes open
for freighters and the splinters
of sunlight that pierce their green depths.
They peer at me through Ziploc plastic
and frost. They dream of Alaska.

They know more than I do
of glaciers and bait, biting flies
and mosquitoes—how close
they hover to the surface
without breaking the tension.

They know more about winter,
the crack of ice, and how far
one must dropp to meet sleep.
They know the true names
of river rock and algae.

They are intimate with trees
that seek their watery home—
mud-slick roots of aspen
and white cedar coiled underwater
carrying news of rain.

The wild trout live so far north,
there is no name for hull,
no name for hook or haul
or limit.

In this California freezer,
they grow lonely as death.
Wintering next to blackberries
and oat bread, their steel scales
grow dull.

They feel the weather drive
deeper than all the years before.
Ice-locked, they do not realize
how far from home
they really are.